Code Blue
by SusieCues
Summary: Harlee Santos and Robert Stahl? Unlikely, but irresistible. Many thanks for reading.
1. Chapter 1

Whenever she listened to him now, it was with her heart, not so much her head, as before. When he'd cornered her, demanding that she 'play ball,' because he had her and Wozniak and the unit dead-to-rights, twisting in the wind, she'd been all fight. Ready to go at him tooth and nail when he'd made a big show of touting that he was going to be her handler, and she had better do everything, and anything, he told her, or face the maximum penalties. Like what? That was supposed to scare her, driving her down to kiss his feet? The FBI would have its way, Stahl had sworn, bent on coming down hard on this cozy set-up of crooked, compromised cops. But first, the Bureau needed clear-cut evidence that Lt. Matt Wozniak and his squad were dirty to the core. Things had gone so wrong, so fast. Worrying thoughts taxed her as never before each day. Life had its insidious way of making bad go worse in no seconds flat. Complicated, these destructive ideas argued with her, riddled her with guilt, as her heart, with increasing strength, drowned them out. She heard with her heart more often, a growing need to listen between the words of Stahl's steel-cut, cut-and-dried words.

This had been her idea, coming to his apartment for yet another talk. His riveting eyes screamed at her from across his room that was esthetically sterile, crying out for letting a good decorator make some needed stylistic changes. Stahl had seemed pleased about her wanting to meet with him here to talk, although at the time he had tried to cover his being all for it up. He'd acted as though he could take her suggestion, or leave it. Had this been wise? Harlee thought nothing of it. What was going down was crucial, and she had to make another plea, beg for the survival of her team. Without Woz, if need be, though the idea of selling out their commander stank. Her heart told her what her mind suppressed, what it didn't wish to hear, demanding she pay attention because what this tormentor in a suit was saying was important. What he said could make the difference between only one man paying for his crimes, or dragging down the entire unit.

Stahl was certain he was saying it loud enough for Harlee not to miss it.

'Come closer…closer…you know you want to…you think you know me…you don't…you think I'm doing this to make your life a nightmare...No...I'm doing this to crack down on corruption that makes all of us in law enforcement look bad...I can't promise I can make this any easier for you…but I can promise I'll protect you...if you let me…I want to...I really do...you're worth it...'

Harlee never broke eye contact, staring at him just as hard as he drilled the look he gave into her. Her heart felt ready to leap out of her chest. The harder Stahl stared, the closer she drifted over to him, like a metal object drawn to a magnet. His pull every description of magnetic. She inched to him almost sensuously, unconsciously sensuous. If she had been wearing a black, scintillating cocktail dress, she would have slinked. He'd seen her in one many times, in his dreams. Her hair, the way she wore it, the way it shimmered like a bevy of kissable waves, set his soul on fire, along with the rest of his hungers. She was a fierce woman, who knew the telling effect she had on men, choosing to capitalize on her magnetism when, and where she chose. Not the other way around. She wasn't exactly sure what she was doing with Stahl right now. Both of them seemed to have much in common with a deer caught in headlights.

After pleading, appealing to the kinder side she hoped he had, in a voice that sliced into him, to let the rest of the team off the hook, she homed in even closer. His aftershave was delicious. Practically roiling in his personal space, warming up to the idea that he might not be the enemy she thought he was at the beginning, she gave him a Mona Lisa-like smile. Beautiful in its fragility. She could tell he was as surprised as she was, her willingly wanting to be this close to him.

Harlee held her breath, as Robert studied her flawless face that was awash in bemusement. For a single, fragile moment they came close to breathing as one, holding on to it as tightly as they could. Until he judged it was time he held her. And the next moment coalesced into the next, and the next, until Robert, reading her tentativeness as indecision, made his move, striking like a cobra. He ran on pure impulse, seeking to possess the substance of his fantasies. Possessing her, even if for only this fleeting moment, welding his hand to her back to mash her lips against his. The shuddering of his body grounded him, while exciting her. He kissed Harlee hard and hungrily, relishing the feel of those saucy, silky lips, always wearing just the right shade of lipstick. Lips dripping confection that had cursed him, reamed him, that had assuredly titillated him, most of all, flush with his. And, shock of shocks; she wasn't peeling herself from his, or his unapologetic embrace. As if what she was doing was unthinkable. No, not at all. Oh, no. In fact, Harlee was returning the kiss as good as he was giving.

And giving...and giving...

When finally, they broke off, as abruptly as they'd started, cop and FBI agent shared an equally guilty look. As though two pairs of sticky-fingered hands had been caught in the cookie jar at the exact same time. Albeit, a most enjoyable time. And at the same time, they played off their lapse of propriety. They'd lived in the moment. Did they know how to spell unprofessional? Like either cared. Harlee would be the last to deny, though not openly, that this straight-laced looking man, who supposedly lived by going by the book, owned a mouth ripe for the taking. She had no words, neither did he, as she watched Stahl as carefully as he watched her. By kissing her, had he joined her side? Or, had she joined his, a hundred percent? Harlee grew more flustered as the seconds ticked off, then heard him say that he was going into the adjoining room, which she assumed was his bedroom, to call his superior.

She wasn't going anywhere near his bedroom, if that indeed was the room he was making the call in. The call that, as he promised, would keep the team out of the mess, and her too, of course. Is that why she had toyed with the idea of kissing him? To put the icing on sealing that deal? Whatever it took, she considered, giving herself a good self-scrutiny and half-smirked. She couldn't help thinking, with a little head-clearing shake of her head...

'Not as all work and no play as he looks... So...what will it take to make you drop this entire investigation and leave all of us alone? Woz too, 'cause I owe that man so much. More than you'd ever understand. He gave me my life back.'

She chided herself while thinking along less than scrupulous lines, and copped an attitude.

'Do I even like him? If I make him think so, what will it get me? As she pressed her index and middle fingers against her lips, she smiled, agreeing that the upstanding FBI man knew what to do with her lips. The rush she felt washed over her again, making her sway where she stood. Beads of sweat broke out on her forehead. What was all this doing to her? Turning her into what? Some who made her cringe when she looked at herself in a mirror?

When Stahl emerged from the room, looking as though he'd done her the greatest favor, she couldn't help but return his little smile. As they stood, contemplating each other, her smile grew, as he walked up to her and settled his arms around her waist to pull her in. She'd offered him a tasty tease. He had to have more. Much more. He was that straight-up junkie crashing down from his first fix. Having more pushed his buttons. Raining openness down into her now unreadable face, he nuzzled her cheek. His contented sigh found its way to her ears. "Offer still stands. Want a drink?"

This time she accepted. "Yeah."


	2. Chapter 2

Tempers, along with fevers were rising in her apartment, once a homey safe-haven, but now a battlefield laced with landmines. Several had already gone off. Her home for herself and Christina had been violated by this infuriating man she had just slapped, and itched to slap again. His taunting eyes sucked her in like a vacuum. Baiting her as only he could. Only his stern cautionary words were preventing her from accosting his face that was smarmy to the max. He dared her not to strike him, staring her down with his arrogance. _Don't you even think about it_ , his eyes growled. Smack me again, and I'll make you know just how deep I'm into you. _I'll own you as sure as you're standing here, for real._ _You, torturing me with your fire and will_. _I've got fire and a will too, Harlee_.

 _The beauty of your face and body, all the passion I know you possess, I want it all, every bit._

For the love of all that writhed in him, he burned for her knowing. Thirsted for her fire that a volcano would envy. _Yes, go on. Do it! Do it_! Reaching into his vault of juvenile trivia, he extricated, _I triple dog dare you!_

Harlee heeded the unspoken warning sizzling in his eyes that egged her on. Her hand used for striking lowered of its own volition. Her furious looks stabbed his face. But his ice blue eyes and the surliness within them tempered her. She had good reason to suppose that if she gave him one more good one across his chops it would drive him insane. Maybe she'd go the same. He had a thing for her, as incredible as that was to consider. Did he think she was capable of wanting him? Her skin crawled as she thought about the 'Harlee lookalike' whom he gleefully subjected to his perverse desires.

How in his right mind could he think she wanted him? What made him think she entertained any thought of him, attacking her with brutal, base savagery? Mr. straight-and-narrow F.B.I. agent was a closet freak, parading around like a model good guy. A headcase with a badge and a gun and a noose around her neck. She was a dirty cop; he was a sleazy phony with sick fantasies bound up in her. Using a pro' as her stand-in. What would a shrink call that?

Wanting to throw-up, as every twisted, disgusting thing that Stahl had ever done to the woman who looked like her in his bedroom overwhelmed Harlee, she swayed where she stood. Trying to appear tough under his watchful scrutiny, she knew she was hardly cutting it. More bravado, ' _bravada_ ' style was needed.

The voice in her head bullied: _Don't give him the satisfaction, thinking he controls you!_

 _Show him who's boss, Har! He's not getting away with what he's doing to you, and what he's trying to do to the people you have trusted with your life all these years! Even if what we're involved in is wrong...this man is wrong for what he's doing, too..._

As if his voice came from far away, she heard him say something about her wearing another wire. Yes, that route again. She bristled, unconcerned over how thinly she wore her veil of contempt. Stahl's face was a mask of smoldering delight trying to palm scuzzy lust off as professional entitlement to do whatever he wanted with her. He was her handler, as he relished making overbearing clear. He had to be kidding with his everything is aboveboard routine. "Take off your shirt." Wanton desire sparked as his predatory-looking eyes undressed her with them. He mimed that she should be quick about it as a frisson had him imaging her exposing herself in all her semi-state of undress glory to him. More of his licking his lower lip ensued.

When she caught him trailing his unnaturally pink tongue along his lower lip again, the soft hairs, ideal for nuzzling, on the back of her neck rose up stiff. Her skin was itching so much, Harlee pictured herself running to the corner _Duane Reade_ for the largest bottle of Calamine lotion sold. "You dirt-bag," she murmured. Revulsion gathered strength and in no uncertain terms, she railed, "You're not putting your hands on me!"

That drove him to the other side of the room as she turned away in disgust, and began unbuttoning her blouse. This was exactly what he wanted, her cringing, being humiliated. Any tender feelings she thought she might have confused with beating this thing because he was really on her side, soured. She stopped herself cold as she remembered what he hadn't done. He'd reneged on his promise to get not only her off, but her team too. Well, that wasn't happening. She knew he had lied. Stahl was playing her; he was a liar. The man was a double-dealer, incapable of coming clean. She'd seen him go into his bedroom and chuck his phone on his bed, pretending to be squaring a deal with Baker to let them off. Never had one man ever infuriated her so. With, the exception of Miguel, the reptilian-like father of her gorgeous baby.

The very man, who, had broken into Harlee's place and was keeping himself well out of sight while overhearing the words passing between Harlee and Stahl. Words that spiked anger in him, gnawed at him, grating his nerves. This very pale, very 'waspy' guy she was with, spouting his bold talk, taking liberties as he consorted with his woman, the mother of his child, rubbed Miguel every which way wrong. Christina's father seethed.

So what made her stomach writhe when Stahl looked at her, a man in obvious torment, from across the room as though mortally wounded since she had just shouted that she didn't trust him? No, she wouldn't permit herself that luxury. She wasn't going to trust him, ever again, the lying pervert. There was no such thing as a luxury in this cesspool of greed, corruption, infamy and vice. What mattered most to her was sweet, young Christina. If she came out of this fiasco in one piece, somehow, she was promising herself and her daughter that they would move on. Make another city, not as big as this one, their home, maybe go to Seattle where it rained a lot, but at least the air was so much cleaner than NYC's soot that was supposedly breathable air. They could live on the outskirts of the oceanic port, home of the Space Needle. See what it felt like to be semi-country girls with big city swagger.

No more dirtying her hands in the name of dishonest gain. End of story. Each time she had told Woz "no," he had been a champ at convincing her she was making the smart choice for Christina. Giving her child that so-called 'better life' she deserved. Christina deserved a mother who didn't lie to her own child. The tangled web of Waz was a dizzying maze of pointed stakes, all turning in on them.

"Harlee..." It hurt saying her name, Stahl noticed, decrying the horrible mess this nightmare had turned into. He had always loved his job, had never had any bobbles the size of these in doing his duty. This one didn't make the list of meritorious cases. His obsession, having started out as kinky, was now full-blown care and affection for this gutsy matriarch, who was all about her daughter and being her own woman. He wanted to be her man, if only so much crap hadn't already passed between them. What had he thought, hiring that pro'? Acting out things so sordid? He was better than that, at least in theory. Duty-bound, yet dragging his feet, loathing the idea of dragging her down with the rest of those implicated, Stahl apologized. "I know how much you hate wearing it." He had enjoyed strapping on that wire the first time a little too much. What he now admitted, she reluctantly found herself wanting to accept, hearing it ring true in spite of the aversion she felt toward him. "I'm sorry."

Harlee nodded, finishing up with ensuring that the listening device would stay in undiscoverable place. "Yeah, yeah. Sure. Sure. You keep saying that. A lot."

"I mean what I say. I've got to start, somewhere..."

"You get to prove it, soon," she batted at him, the liar and the cheat. Was he capable of being straight with her?

When the heist went down, how he wished he could be close by, ready to jump in to save her, if things went horribly south. Whatever went down, he wasn't letting anything bad happen to Harlee. He'd made that promise with himself. She would be safe because he was making it his business to keep her that way. Forget his hardnosed boss, Baker. He was determined to look out for what had fast become his Number One, Harlee. Despite how hard she protested for him to keep away from her, when he coaxed her into his arms, she filled them not protesting, sighing against the rumpled fabric over his chest of his uniform the F.B.I. called a suit.

"Please," she pleaded, "please save my team. Don't indict them. I'm begging you..." His name quivered on the tip of her tongue before she set it free. "Robert..."

Holding her as close as he could, above her soft, wavy hair that he dared wrap his fingers around, he whispered, "I got you. I swear." He filled his hand with those silky, lustrous curls, losing himself in their fascination. And hers.

"You'd better," she told him with the tenacity she drugged him with, "or else..."

"Or else what?" he demanded, inches from her siren lips.

"Your butt's mine," Harlee threatened with a bit of teasing laced in her voice.

His heart skipping beats, Stahl practically convulsed. "Do you mean that?"

"One conquest at a time, G-man." His hot breath lapped against her mouth before he crushed her smile against his and Harlee wheezed, "Word-skippy!"


	3. Chapter 3

Money, money, money...money...Money. Twelve million dollars worth sat like an emperor's ransom on the table. Alongside it, Harlee couldn't help hearing the voice in her head murmur the O'Jay's hit tune, _'For The Love Of Money.' 'For the love of money...people will lie, they will cheat. For the love of money people don't care who they hurt, or_ _beat_.' So many people, their lives destroyed, for what? This. The fortune, messing with her mind. Never in her whole uphill life had she ever seen so many greenbacks at one time, in one place. Even the air in this little room seemed to be sucked out, and the money breathed new life into it. The stacks of bills had been all neatly arranged by her accomplice, Curtis Deville, more often times than not she calls 'Caddie.' How the stolen dough beckoned her, seductively calling her name. She forgot all about her banged up face and bruised body. "Money, money, money. Money!" she softly whispered, making the seedy tall blond with skull-like, scruffy face smile. They were in the money, and that was no lie. Heaps of lies had led to this windfall.

Harlee, gloating, repeated what she'd said moments ago. "We're calling the shots now."

The man, a user of drugs, claiming he wasn't hardcore anymore, needled her with a look. He thought of what he could buy with a mere fraction of this loot and the thought practically got him stoned. "Which means?" Caddie imposed, doing the math of his cut he'd been promised.

"Linklater, Woz, my sharpest pain in my backside, Stahl, get off my back." Drunk with power, which was as dirty, illusive and seductive as money, Harlee fixated on the hard-won piles of ill-gotten gain. Possessing leverage to bargain with was a beautiful thing. Just as she thought that, her phone buzzed. Seeing who it was ticked in her stomach. Her bane, and her zeal the man was. Excusing herself from Caddie, who didn't need to be in on the conversation, she stationed herself behind some packing crates. Her voice low, level, self-possessed. "Yeah?"

"Are you with Woz? Can you talk?" A delectable image of her face came into sharper focus in his mind's eye, causing his heart to skip beats in anticipation of being with her again. Seeing the fire flare in her eyes when he said something that got her going. He yearned for her touch, her finger flicks across his face and at the base of his throat. His arms were important for the sole purpose of penting her up in them. Hearing her voice brought out the beast in him. A beast needing to loosen his tie and reach for the nearest bottle of water on the FBI breakroom table.

Stahl sounded like a lion ready to roar. Licking his chops over his prey before ripping its victim to shreds. Shards of flesh the price to be paid for not being fleet and nimble enough. His deceptive air of tranquility was a sham, evoking wariness. He could not be trusted, but that didn't stop her from seeing him as her sure way out of this debacle. The ace in the hole was obvious. The man craved her as much as he wanted to nail the coffin on the corruption she was involved in shut. "No." Nodding, she fed, "Huh uh. Yeah."

"Your man-"

"What do you mean, 'my man?'" Immediately, bizarre images of Miguel flooded her brain, distorting her perception of reality. A mosaic of sweat droplets beaded on her filmy forehead. "What man?" she demanded, her voice rising stormily.

"Loman." He'd said the name with such finality, it made Harlee's tight skin crawl.

Waiting to hear what she thought he was on the verge of saying, she laced a menacing tone with her words. "So? What about him?"

"He says he's not mixed up with the heist."

"He's telling the truth. He hasn't been with us long enough. Woz kept him in the dark."

Stahl huffed and laid some of his cards on the table. "He says the robbers wore masks, preventing him from IDing anyone." And Stahl couldn't help thinking, _How convenient_... _How very_...'

"Masks, Harlee?" Her inquisitor snorted. "Did you tell him to say that?"

Her facial cheeks burning, she stalled, internalizing what she'd coached Loman to say. She milked her mind for just what to say, and how to say it. Or risk Stahl blowing a gasket. _No! Not now_! She was coming up empty. The best she could do was, "He is telling the truth, like I told you before. He's on the outside of all this."

Far from satisfied, Stahl dropped the thread of that conversation, thinking to himself about its being picked up, later. Over fine wine and steaks cooked to perfection. He would never peg her as a vegetarian. Not with those red-blooded instincts of hers. He'd located a restaurant for fine dining owned by a past winner of Top Chef.

"Like I said, I need more time."

Fine, she wanted more time, he'd give her all the time she needed. His undivided attention over dinner at the five-star bistro. "I'm giving you more time, Harlee. And for kicking off that more time you sound desperate for, you're having dinner with me. Tonight." He loved giving ultimatums, infusing supremacy into his blood. She might have a slight advantage over him. It wasn't hard seeing himself do what he could for her. She'd be forever grateful and he'd collect on the favor.

Though the 'but,' had formed on her lips, Harlee kept it from his ears. Submissively, she acquiesced, "Yeah, okay. Sure. Like, what time?"

"Eight..." He left her hanging, purposely, then whisked in, "Thirty. Be ready. I don't like being kept waiting."

He would have eaten up the sneer she was wearing. Truculently, she batted back, "Tell me something I don't know."

His smile was pure Machiavellian, with a twist. The woman he browbeat had him eating out the palm of her hand. "Show me what you look like in filmy black."

Suppressing her gulp, Harlee jeered, "You wish."

"I do. Make it come true..."


	4. Chapter 4

It was done. Hatred rolled off her. Her instinct for self-preservation, coupled with the power she wielded for protecting Christina, was never stronger. She'd snapped Miguel's neck and felt nothing. Nothing, except an overwhelming sense of relief. She had seen to taking her abuser, in the guise of monster, out of their lives. Forever.

She needed no permission. She couldn't be anything other than what she was, couldn't pretend that there could have been any other way. He'd forced the issue. Had planted himself in her home with every intention of raping her, demanding she like it. That she beg him to never stop. She saw what she liked, lying dead at her feet. Miguel, broken, defeated; he'd never harass her or Christina ever again. Relief washed over Harlee as she surveyed what her infuriation and resentment had wrought.

Tethered to the mortal coil, with its chaos and confusion filling her head, she snapped out of her momentary reverie. Nearly at the precise moment when she regrouped with a newer reality, there came sharp, heavy pounding on her door. If it kept up, her door would be kindling. Panicking momentarily, she hardly breathed, grasping at who this could be. She ordered herself to keep her cool. For one strange moment she thought it might be Woz. Come for her, to take her away with Linda. Then, they'd collect Christina and disappear into the night.

Her silent, confused conjecturing was rewarded when her caller's frantic, strident voice filled her ears.

"Harlee, Harlee!" The edge to his voice was palpable, as though its jagged glint seeped its way through the door's narrow edges. Intent on getting to her in the worst way. He was picturing her with her ex's hand wrapped around her throat, demanding she get rid of whomever was interrupting their private time. The F.B.I. agent fumed. Surly thoughts bombarded his mind. If anyone was going to bend his latest crush to his will, it would be him. Not Christina's felonious father.

Hearing that voice galvanized her. What did he want? What would it take to make him go away? Hardly frightened, Harlee listed forward, moving on the door and rasped, "What do you want, Stahl?" She rested her ear against the door, seeing him in her mind's eyes. What was he doing here? Why now? She quietly begged for him to just leave her alone. What made him think that this thing he had for her was mutual?

Was snapping his neck too in her future?

"Are you all right? _Tell me_! Are you all right?"

She was now. Miguel was _dead_.

"I'm fine. Fine. I told you. There's nothing until I get that e-mail, guaranteeing immunity for me and my crew. What part of getting the e-mail don't you get?"

His superior still needed more delicate coaching about exonerating all guilty parties. "I'm not here about that," he spat, itching to tear her door down. His voice lowered an octave. "Let me in." The last thing he wanted was getting her killed. He loosened his tie, doubling as a noose, and reiterated his plea. "Please. Harlee, let me in."

What made him think he could bandy her name about so easily? Yet, something buried in his voice's cadence, something urgent and full of concern, spurred her. Convinced her she should obey. Owning her actions, she unlocked the door. Allowing him admittance was gradual.

"Yeah?" she asked, the chain on the door putting him off. Her last line of defense. Harlee's frown was a formidable deterrent in its own right. The virility of his aftershave surfeited her sense of smell, declaring in no uncertain terms that he was a man on high alert.

"Open up!"

"Can't."

"Why?" he bullied.

"I'm not decent…"

Her breathtaking body swaddled in that soft, modest bathroom convinced him otherwise. He decided against making some inane crack about her current state of delectable undress. His sigh like a gust, he met her eyes with his without a hint of annoyance. Like some overaged Boy Scout, Stahl bantered, "I'll cover my eyes, if you like."

She debated; Robert had taken to skimming his broad index finger over the intruder-proof chain-link barrier.

"Harlee," he said sharply, "I know you're not alone."

"Says you." A fresh wave of disquietude coursed through her, succeeding in weakening her a fraction.

"Yeah. Says me." Boldly, he declared, "I've been across the street since before you got here. I saw Zepeda go in. Is he still in there with you?" A greater note of urgency crept into his voice. " **Is he**?" A thousand and one dangerous scenarios seized control of his already adrenaline-fueled brain.

"He's gone," Harlee insisted, casting hard eyes at her ex's corpse. She'd twisted his head, and as sure as she leaned against this door, reliving the satisfying response she'd given to his fetid lasciviousness, she rejoiced.

"I'm not leaving until I'm sure of that."

"Stahl, you are one stubborn _bruto_ ," Harlee lobbed with gleams in her intense eyes that stared him down. " _Un dolor real_!"

"A real pain, huh? I've been called worse. By you." Her crooked smile had him smiling. Full of surprises, he retorted, " _Bruto_. That's Spanish for crude, rough. Ah…stupid, too. _Si_?"

" _Habla_?"

"Just enough… _Lo suficiente_. _Nena_." He jiggled the chain, thwacking it up and down, being a general pain in her backside, and loving every minute of it. Clearly, she didn't appear under undue duress, so maybe Zepeda had really cleared out. He still needed to see for himself. Then, he'd go. Or, maybe not, at least not so quickly. He was hoping for an invitation to stay.

"I'm **not** your _baby_ ," Harlee slugged, enjoying seeing his uppity smirk vanish.

"Com'on. Let me in." How he wished she wanted to be, his mind overturned.

There was no way she could allow that, but at the same time, he had all the determination of a Mack truck for not being put off. "Go away. I'm not going to tell you again!"

"No," he stubbornly insisted.

Harlee leaned in against the door, closing it. Locking the door was her definitive response.

Stahl protested, "You can lock me out, but you can't shut me out."

In her head, the words rang out: "I can sure try..."

Snorting, she told him, "Goodnight, Stahl," and walked away from the door and to Miguel's corpse, wearing a face that looked more like a mask.


	5. Chapter 5

Tired, numb and fed up with her world, Harlee sank deeper into the cushiony softness of her pillow-top mattress. She threw an arm across her face, ruing that no amount of hot water pouring down on her flesh had been enough to soothe her. Miguel's death mask trespassed where it didn't belong, here in her bedroom. She relived snapping his neck like a twig. His lifeless countenance mocked her, looming larger and larger before her eyes closed tightly shut. His face, the face she'd defaced in the shallow grave she'd dug, stared her down.

She'd ended his miserable life; his vile nature and brutish, salacious behavior had driven her to kill. She was no murderer, but her conscience gnawed at her, nevertheless. Dead he was, and dead he deserved to be. A profound sense of relief gradually dulled her conscience so she could begin thinking more clearly. Her heart unweighted. Miguel, that abominable excuse for a man, would never plague Christina and her ever again. Good riddance! Harlee had bought them space.

And yet, memories of the man who'd fathered Christina lived on. Those lurid recollections might never go away, but in time, they could weaken, she prayed. She contorted herself into a fetal position and lay motionless. Then she shuddered atop the fresh linens that were rose-scented thanks to fabric softener, and groaned as another man's hard-edged features insistently supplanted Miguel's twisted face. This other face's intrusion splintered the framework of her thoughts.

"No-no! Get out of my head!"

She capped her ears with trembling hands.

One slimy rat was traded for another. One just as bad, or, incredibly, worse? Imagery of accidental-on-purpose run-ins, clandestine meetings and annoying phone calls at all hours, swirled in the pupil of her mind's eye. Woz knew about the wire she'd worn, at Stahl's bidding; had ratted her out. Matt didn't trust her now, claiming he'd never be able to. Could she regain Woz's trust? That would take time, if it could really be regained at all.

Harlee pressed her arm she threw over her face again harder against her face. Groaning, she shivered, and pulled her robe to better cover her nakedness. Impossibly, she felt the F.B.I. agent's eyes ogling her. Her riotous imagination running away with her. Anger, frustration and fear weighed on her heavily once again. The future was fuzzy. The unknown, its presence palpable, crowded her as if she were hemmed in from all sides, leaving her no place to stand.

Sneaky Stahl-the constant in her life now, held all the cards. The little voice in her head cursed his name. Like filth layering objects in a cramped, musty room, the agent's unwholesome mind-set was clear. The liar that he was had no intention of letting her go. His assurances were hollow indeed, utterly worthless. Did having her under his grubby thumb make him feel whole? The maggot was dead set on crawling over every inch of her supple, delectable body. His lily white hands, steeped in contagion, corrupting, sullying all that they touched, itched to grope her. Defiling her as they fondled.

Harlee bit down on her balled-up hand. If any hope of saving Wozniak from prison existed, she'd have to be the sacrificial lamb. But, she certainly wasn't naïve; she knew what it took to handle ruthless men, while they were being ruthless. Prostituting herself, feeding Stahl's wacko fantasies made her cringe. He thought much of himself; she only saw a man possessed of unnatural appetites. Could she willingly allow him to degrade her as if she were some back alley slut? She gagged, all the while knowing she could never allow Woz to go down.

She owed him so much, everything. On the strength of the loyalty and love she felt for her mentor, and yes, her good friend, could she withstand Stahl's seamy, steamy onslaughts? Offer up her body upon the altar to save Woz? The repugnance of her situation snaked its tortuous way through her psyche.

Driving a fist into the bed, Harlee croaked:

"You freakin' scumbag, Stahl-"

Her phone's ringtone interrupted, catching in her ears. Rankling, she crossed her eyes. Her intuition tipped her off as to who this was. Her phone was new, but her number was still the same. Her spine tingling, she answered.

"What now?"

Stahl chuckled; the bark of her demand turning him on. Keeping his voice low, he funneled into her ear, "What do you think?"

If Harlee bristled any more, she would turn into a hairbrush. Glowering, she bit off, "Thought you didn't have anything else to say to me."

"Where'd you get that from?"

"You said so. You made it clear earlier today. I'm not making it up," she insisted. Though she knew that was far from true, she'd felt like saying it anyway.

Stahl was the canny cat; she, the sexy mouse, trapped in a maze of his making.

"How do you have the balls to play Woz and me?" she spat. "He won't play your game-not for long."

"It's as easy-as-peezy. He'll do what I want him to do. You'll do that too. What? You think F-B-I stands for: Foolish Bimbos Incorporated?" Stahl sneered, rolling his eyes in an office of one of the Directors he was currently sitting in. "I know exactly how to play him...and _you_."

Harlee raised her voice. "Why can't you just leave us alone? Stop harassing us."

The prick, who thought he was so slick, thoroughly infuriated her.

"Now, you know, and I know. I can't do that. You 'good' guys broke the law."

His supercilious laughter antagonized her all the more, all the way down to the beds of her toenails.

"Then, I'll take the rap. Let Wozniak off the hook," Harlee beseeched.

"Ah," Stahl breathed deeply, heckling when he uttered, "foreplay..."

"Shut-up!"

The shrillness of her voice bounced off the walls of her modern-style bedroom. Those walls felt as though they were closing in.

"Make me," Stahl fired back, baiting her. Snorting, he obnoxiously parried, "Anyway you like..." The innuendo slithered just below the surface of his nauseating question. "What're you wearing?"

"Pig!"

"Oink-oink," he chided, laughing.

"I'm hanging up!"

Like an arrow launched, hitting its mark, he replied, "Don't-not before I give you the four-one-one."

He had the gall to start breathing heavily. Harlee wanted to reach through the phone to punch in the smug look she knew his face was wearing. His heavy breathing, clogging her ears, she berated, "You suck!"

Stahl simpered. All hot and heavy, he acknowledged, "Oh, yeah."

Just barely controlling herself, Harlee squeezed through lips she hardly moved, "That's it-I'm done. The harassment ends here."

"Harassment?" He sounded tickled, as he pretended to be offended. The underbelly of his tone mocked her. "Nah. Dinner...my place. Tomorrow night." Softly, he advised, "Don't stand me up, like last time."

Dining with the enemy, alone in his drab, ugly apartment? She would sooner dine with Darth Vader in a room full of crocodiles. A loathing akin to what she'd felt towards Miguel filled her. The pain behind her eyes was stabbing.

Calmly, she deflected, "Can't." She wasn't sorry when she said, "Sorry." Uncontestably, she claimed, "I have a previous engagement."

"Break it," Stahl ordered.

"Like I said, _can't_ ," she firmly reiterated. "I made plans with my daughter. We're going to see the New York City Ballet's _Swan Lake_. I've let her down too many times in the past. I won't-not this time."

"One word."

He prolonged the suspense, keeping her in it for as long as it pleased him. With conniving finesse, he turned the knife.

"It's a name, actually. One you know all too well."

He didn't have to say it; Harlee knew.

"Wozniak," she murmured, wincing, glad Stahl wasn't around to see her squirm for as many times. "When?" she asked, rolling over, her voice tight, betraying a trace of defeat.

He couldn't witness her fragility. He was a huge jerk, and would relish seeing how vulnerable she was right now. His relentless hounding felt like huge rocks pelting her body.

"Let's not make it too late. I've got lots of big plans for our evening."

Harlee's face went ashen, as pale as the moon high above her residence. She digested the depth of sleaze he meant by that.

Brazenly, he continued, "Eight o'clock feels right."

No, it did _not_ -not by long shot. Dreck oozed from him, over the phone, befouling her.

Hardly an afterthought, he stipulated, "Oh, wear something tasteful."

Regardless of whatever attire she chose, he'd peel her out of those clothes soon enough, when it suited him.

"Like you're a judge of what's tasteful."

Stahl grinned, gratified. "You'd be surprised. I'm full of them. Sensational ones."

Surprises weren't all he was full of, Harlee mused sardonically. Her bad mood in full bloom, she replied, "Crappy surprises are like toothaches-horrible."

Brashly, he easily defended, " _My_ surprises _aren't_." He enticed, "You'll see. You'll come back for more. And more, and more, and more."

 _Shut-up, shut-up, shut-up_ , tolled in her brain.

She wanted neither him, nor his creepy, nasty surprises his abnormal brain had in mind. But, he had her where he'd plotted for her to be. Until she managed to get herself out from under his control, she had no choice. She must go along.

Though she'd visited his apartment before, she couldn't remember where he lived, so he told her.

Mildly, Harlee informed her puppet master, "I'll be there between eight and eight-thirty." Then she snapped, "Bye." And moments before ending this gratuitous call, she pictured herself showing up at his lair in super-baggy sweats beneath an over-sized raincoat that would be too loose even for Lou Ferrigno.

"Don't hang up," Stahl exacted. And yet, had there been a hint of groveling twined with his voice?

Really, what was his deal? Was he a perverted louse, a dyed-in-the-wool misfit, who couldn't get a date like a normal guy? She attracted him obviously, but why did he have to be all Grade A psycho about it? Was he afraid? Afraid that the real him, an average, run-of-the-mill mortal, would repulse her?

More than he already was now?

"What?"

"I can't wait," he cooed, exuding scary desire as he licked his lips and faintly moaned.

"Ugh! You're really sick. Y'know that right-"

He laughed, driving Harlee up the wall.

She terminated the call then and there, done with his nonsense at least until it was mandatory she see him. Back first, she flounced down to the bed, tossing her phone up into the air behind her. Her hair fanned out about her face, framing it stunningly, as if it were a portrait, one of turmoil etched in her own impotence.

Defiantly, though, she rallied, "You think you've got me. But, who has whom? Harlee don't play-dat, homie. Fifty shades of Gray ain't my way, sicko. You'll see."

She smiled a robust smile and vowed again:

" _You'll_ see."


	6. Chapter 6

He'd been angry before, but not like this. He twirled in his hand the bugging device he'd punched holes in the wall of his living room to get at. He'd ripped it out. He had made the man responsible for what he was going to be denied pay. Stahl was a new compendium of anger. Mr. F.B.I. was livid on steroids. Hours ago at the courthouse he'd been emasculated. But, who had the upper hand now? He did, that's who.

Tit-for-tat. After what Wozniak had done to him, he'd outed 'Woz,' the rat. Now the dirty cop's wife knew just what kind of a sleaze-bucket her 'man' was.

Score for dirty tricks: It was a tie.

Getting in here had been easy. He'd been deliberately noisy. She'd hear the break-in and come to investigate. That's how she was, always on top of things...

That thought, which his mind instantly converted into hard-core imagery, distracted him a moment or so until _she appeared_ , a veritable vision, sublime, attainable.

 _Surprise_!

 _His_ vixen looked mildly alarmed. What did he expect? A panicky, distraught woman? Not _his Harlee_.

Momentarily mesmerized by her, Robert froze. Time didn't stand still, but it did glitch sluggishly.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded, entering the space that separated her kitchen from the living room where he expectantly awaited _his_ prize. The tone of her voice was rigid, brooking no equivocation.

With her life in turmoil, at least her house wasn't a mess. Wait! Why did that matter? This pesty man had broken into her home! She laughed to herself, thinking about not having the luxury of being able to call the cops.

He began talking. Somehow the sound of his voice was muted. The words he spoke made no sense as he got to his feet and gravitated toward her.

This was no delusion, a product of his manic-inventive mind. This was surreal, though. He was here in her house. He'd sneaked in, visiting her in the dead of night. Why? Because he needed to see her. Had desperately yearned to be near her. He'd sent the poor substitute for her packing. This woman of his dreams was wearing only a robe. Robert's nerve endings tingled; nothing between them but terrycloth and his stuffy suit. He was one walking disaster, addicted to Harlee. Which could ultimately lead to self-destruction.

What if he... Robert blinked.

"Hey, are you all right?"

His eyes met hers.

Was that genuine concern, or pity? No pity, oh no-not from her. He'd rather have her contempt.

He looked at her, his expression stricken, as if reality had struck him with a belt. He wasn't fantasizing. He was with her now; it was she, in the flesh, asking how he was. Again, he asked himself, 'What if he...took her in his arms? Showed her he was the only man for her? And not that namby-pamby Assistant District Attorney, James Nava, whom she'd turned to.'

Why she had, Robert would never understand, but that man acted as if he had a right to helping himself to Harlee. That right was his, and his alone.

"What's?"

"No... _No_ , I'm not all right."

"Why'd you come _here_?" she barked.

"I've lost him..." Robert mumbled, like half the domineering man she knew. "No thanks to you and your deranged boss."

Why wasn't he making sense? "Lost _him_? Lost _who_?"

Harlee kept staring at him, his facial expression bleak.

Stahl felt drugged, as if someone had slipped an IV filled with Rohypnol, ruffies, into his arm when he hadn't been looking. "Didn't you hear what I said? I lost custody of my kid. It'll be a miracle if I'm granted visitation. Your precious Woz ruined _everything_ for me!" He took another step closer to Harlee.

She defensively backed away. The little voice in her mind ordered her to keep her distance. Stahl had the look of 'loose cannon' in his eyes. He could go off at any second.

"How..." She bit her lower lip. "What did he do?" Instinctively, seeing Stahl brazenly eyeing her partially-exposed cleavage, Harlee blocked his view. She adjusted the robe's saggy V-neck. His insolence infuriated her, but she reined in her pique, getting a grip on her hair-trigger emotions. She refused to lose it in front of Stahl, setting him off in the process.

When she kept her cool, it was she who wielded the upper hand.

"I know you bugged my place. And _he_ put what you did to good use. Or, was posting that video all _your_ idea?" Harlee's mouth was agape. Stahl continued, "The video went viral. Anybody with eyes saw it. The timing was perfect for screwing me over with my court date. My reputation's shot." Robert's voice, thick, caught as it trailed off, sounding very much like a sob. He teetered between breaking down, or being just as hard-nosed as she.

He swayed on his legs. His impertinent urges gripped him and in his mind's eye he saw himself lash out. Starting with...stripping away that false sense of security she imagined she had. Then off would come that robe which had come undone again. He would have some fun...

Of course, Harlee would beat him down before she tried killing him, but that would be fun too.

Reprimanding him, his heart yelled that he stop being such an incredible jerk, for once!

He hadn't come here to rape, right? He'd told himself he'd wanted a rap session.

Harlee kept her face neutral, controlling her sneer. Instead of saying, 'Serves you right. You did this to yourself, Mister Perv,' she murmured, "I'm sorry. I didn't know..." She wasn't sorry for having bugged his residence, nor for doing what he'd done. The disgusting evidence of his sick fascination with her on that video was documented. There was a price to be paid, and he faced paying it. Losing close association with his boy. Her heart flooded with empathy. Miguel had threatened to insert himself into Christina's life. That very idea had tortured Harlee. Had impelled her to do what she'd done.

"You should be," Robert criticized, moving in closer to her still.

"Look, Woz needed...needed..."

"Leverage," he bit off, curling his lip cruelly. Another look crossed his face, but it was fleeting. Here he was, having been angrier than words could describe with her, and now...all he could do was breathe her in. Savor her. Revel in the intoxicating Harlee Santos:

The corrupt officer, a fixture with the NYPD's 64th Precinct. The ravishing single mother of teenage Cristina. Harlee...his reluctant informant, just another word for puppet, slaving for Wozniak, who couldn't have been a worse person for her to be mixed up with. That wretch would never trust her again, so he claimed.

But, how long would that last?

Harlee thought Stahl's look was one of remorse. Since it hadn't lasted long, she couldn't be sure. Another look then, one of cocksureness, supplanted that which she couldn't name.

"No," she said, trying to make herself sound less vindictive. "Control. That's what Woz is about. He needs it like food."

"Or like...sex," Robert dared to say.

Silently, they had a meeting of the minds. A kind of understanding passed between them.

His urge to grab Harlee, tear her robe away, revealing her exquisite form in all its naked loveliness, again subsided. His sordid desires died down. Revived was respect for this tough, beautiful woman. A woman, not sex object, in every sense of the word. Maybe one day, she'd allow him to taste what she had to offer carnally, on her own terms.

On his way out, Robert said, "Goodnight."

She didn't return the parting expression, just nodded, watching him leave. The hairs on the back of her neck slowly wilted back to normal. She didn't head upstairs. Something intangible told her to slip over to a window. The shade of which was drawn halfway. The curious urge to watch him drive off had come over her. Two fingers shifted the shade away slightly from the glass and she observed.

And as she monitored, she froze, seeing what she saw unbelievable. Those hairs on the back of her neck sprang up a second time. Did her eyes deceive her?

A figure emerging from the pitch-black shadows jumped Stahl. Intense scuffling ensued. Then the knock-down, drag-out fight was on. The battle, full-out _Epic_! The harder Stahl fought, the harder more manically Woz pounded him. He never gave Stahl a chance to recover, brutally slamming the blond man's body over and over with punishing punches and savage kicks.

Woz was out for blood!

Harlee gasped. Choking, she witnessed Woz pinning Stahl to the hood of the agent's car. Her superior began strangling the life out of him. Out of her house as if she'd been shot out of a cannon, she sprinted up to the crazed strangler, who was so into his strangling, he never knew she had the drop on him.

With her gun drawn and its business end aimed squarely at Woz's head, Harlee cried, "Stop! Stop! _Stop_!"

Woz paid no attention; he must kill this sorry sack of crap.

Harlee hollered 'stop' over and over until the crazed strangler quit trying to strangulate Stahl. "What are you doing! You can't kill him! It'll be the end for you! Woz-listen to me! _Stop_!"

Wozniak, with a dazed look etched in his face, let up. His hands fell away from the coughing man. He stared blankly at Harlee, then stumbled away, muttering to himself. Scuffling down the half-lit street like one of AMC's 'Walking Dead.'

"Woz!"

She could have cried until blue in the face. It wouldn't have mattered. She was dead to him.

"Are you all right? Are you all right?" she asked the raggedly-breathing man, barraging him with concern, kneeling beside him. "Stahl-speak to me. Are you all right?"

If Woz had killed the agent, it would have been his funeral too. She'd had to stop him.

With a hand still at his throat, which bore ligature-like marks, and opening his eyes, Robert struggled. It took a few moments before he was able to rasp, "I'll live, thanks to you. I owe you. You saved my life."

"And Woz's."

"Yeah, like you said."

Harlee shook her head, floored. "What got into him?"

"Me."

"Huh?"

"His wife saw the video I posted of him on the down-low with Donnie Pomp. Did you know he swings both ways?"

"You did what!" Harlee yowled, incredulous with eyes like saucers.

"Mrs. Wozniak now knows she's been married to a low-life, two-timing-bi scumbag all these years."

"You prick!" she harangued.

"Me and him...we're even."

Rising, Harlee stood straight and true. Furious. "Don't make me sorry!"

"For what?"

"Saving your life!" she hurled, glaring at him and stomping her way to her home.


	7. Chapter 7

Stahl was out of his hallucinatory mind! He was a man possessed. As if Harlee didn't already know that. She fumbled with words and ideas. He'd just shot Terrence Linklater, the mastermind of the bank robbery. Had shot him right through his head. Why had he done that! And what had been behind all that mumbo-jumbo double-talk about his hoping she would give their working relationship a chance. No dice.

He was twisted and unstable, a menace. A man she could never fully trust.

As he turned to leave Woz and her, Harlee still felt dazed. Stahl didn't go right away. He paused his departure, turning back to her. A light breeze ruffled a tuft of his wheat-blond hair.

Harlee felt as though he expected her to look at him. She couldn't bring herself to.

"You coming?" He smirked again.

All of this felt like a nightmare from which she couldn't wake up, a terrible, heartbreaking torment that wouldn't fade.

"No," Harlee told him definitively.

He gave her a look, an intense, soul-searching one.

"Suit yourself," he said, then turned away and began leaving for the car parked in the access ramp to this dank, cimmerian place.

This old, long-abandoned warehouse, she'd no doubt have vivid nightmares about from now on. It was cold and foreboding here. In the background, were those pigeons cooing?

"Like I said, you know how to get rid of bodies," Stahl said, meaning Harlee. A smile meant to perplex his lovely pawn contorted his lips.

Woz, still mighty stunned himself from what his nemesis had done to, what was supposed to have been their bargaining chip, gawked at Santos. "Why does he keep saying _that_?"

An anxious, worried look washed over Harlee's beautiful, distraught face. She shivered involuntarily. Was it conceivable? But how would he have a clue? He was nosing around, trying to find out where her ex was. Could it be possible? Did he know that she'd killed Miguel? At the thought of his face, frozen in death, she shivered even more.

Would it matter to maniacal Stahl that she'd killed the louse in self-defense? Would he believe that?

"Don't know. I have no idea," she whispered. Her lie made her skin crawl. She couldn't help reliving snapping his neck, carting him off to the plot wherein she'd buried him. Was she turning into a sick, cruel whacko? Being pulled apart my vicious, unforgiving pressures?

What she and Tufo had talked about in the car came to mind. Were they the ones far from innocent? Did they care about what was right or wrong anymore? From a moral standpoint, maybe Tufo was right. Were the stealing, lies, extortion and cover-ups justifiable?

Had they become even worse than the perps they went after? Just another breed of ruthless, self-serving criminals?

"Not like your _associate_ needs any pointers in the disposal of the dead either," Stahl commented with his ever-ready smirk drilling holes in Harlee.

She heard Miguel's voice clanging insistently in her throbbing head: ' _You didn't have to kill me, querida mia. I just needed to be close with our mija. Cristina is mine! You had no right to keep me from her. You knew that. I'll never let you forget._..'

Harlee squeezed her eyes shut. She would never forget how the disease that was Miguel had wanted to rape their child! Pain marched across the bridge of her nose. She wondered if she was going to make it out alive from all of this.

" _Harlee_..." Woz breathed, a good deal tauntingly, despising her with his eyes. "Clear off. I'll handle this myself."

She looked at Woz as though he'd just told her to go hang herself. Harlee took a step toward him, but he backed off from her. "Go!" he cried, turning his back on her. Going to Linklater's corpse, he began examining the head wound with great interest. The bullet had gone clean through. The blood around the entry point had begun drying.

An odd chill snaked along Woz's spine.

"Do you need an engraved invitation to get out of here?" he bellowed. " _Leave-now_! I won't tell you again!"

She gaped at him in stunned silence.

And do what? Tag along with Stahl? Enough was enough with her having to endure the bizarreness of this delusional, off-the-wall man who had deviltry in his eyes. And the flaming thing he had for her that went along with his craziness. Harlee would sooner hitchhike with a serial ax murderer. Well, maybe not, but she as sure as confetti fell in a ticker tape parade didn't want to ride back with the thorn in her side, masquerading as a respectable citizen.

"You know what? Both of you can go straight to where you know you belong!"

What she'd said amused Stahl, but angered Woz.

He spun away from the dead body, glaring at her with fire in his eyes. There was malice mingled with hurt in them too. "Get outta my sight-you lousy snitch!"

"My pleasure," Harlee replied as gently as snow falling on a countryside.

Why did these two get under her skin so? _Why-why-why_? Now she knew full well the meaning of being stuck between a rock and a hard place. Woz was the rock; Stahl was the hard place. Both of them, making it harder and harder for her each day to ward off having a nervous breakdown.

Stahl, really making an effort to be civil, as he'd said they should be to each other from now on, extended, "It'd be my pleasure, driving you to wherever you need to go."

"See, Harlee," Woz began taunting, "told you so. I'm right. Can't fool me. He _is_ your new ' _boyfriend_.'" His laugh was hollow, infuriating.

She wanted to rip Matt's head off where he stood, ridiculing her too. She thought to say something to really shut him up, but she didn't. She kept her cool and smiled. "Night, Woz. Hope you can get a good night's rest."

"I wish the same for you, Harlee. Don't keep _him_..." jutting his chin at Stahl, "up all night." Woz laughed and laughed, making a sleaze of himself.

Stahl took the innuendo in stride. Did he balk, having been referred to as her 'new man?'

In no way did he look insulted.

Harlee took deeper steps into the Twilight Zone. After she sneered, she began storming away, dismissing them both. The staccato stomping of her feet echoed in the gloom.

Woz went to work, making a call that would facilitate what he needed to do with Linklater.

Stahl, performing some fancy footwork, caught up with Harlee. His entire demeanor changed, and with the change, he offered like a bona fide gentleman, the one he wanted her to see him as, "All business, which includes no funny business aside...I'd be honored if you'd allow me to drive you home, Ms. Santos..."

Something twisted in her stomach as she looked him up and down, thought about it once, then twice, and finally said, "Fine...I accept."

Stahl didn't fawn over her, act the fool, nor say anything snide. He smiled, allowing her to lead the way.

Which she did, all the way back to the car. Once she got in, and then he, he asked her, "Can I buy you dinner?"

Shaking her head, Harlee said, "Let's maintain a strict non-fraternization policy, okay?"

Though her tone was adamant, Stahl could see there might be a little room for some leeway.

Accommodating her, he replied, "Whatever you say, Ms. Santos..."

"Good."

"Good," he rejoined, started up the engine and backed out of the blind alley, content to let Harlee enjoy the ride in peace.


	8. Chapter 8

In a few hours, yet again, someone was going to die. So many bodies; so little remorse over the taking of life. As though killing was nothing more than blowing out a candle, hallmark of a world that ground decency and fairness down, and spit it out.

That thought kept festering, kept Harlee unfocused, roaming the streets at this hour after she'd left the bar and grill, trying to think what to do next. Julia's name screamed in her head as strange shadows loomed, stretching ever onward before her. Cars screeched. Voices shouted. Underground trains rumbled and hissed like unseen snakes writhing at the night. The cacophony bombarded her like a crowd of hollering protesters, demonstrating in front of City Hall that pressed in on her from all sides.

She didn't want to see him, not ever again. And yet, she knew that was impossible. She'd see him again...seeing Stahl was inevitable. He was like a moth irresistibly drawn to a porch light.

She that porch light installed with a thousand-watt bulb. Blinding and enticing him every flutter of the way.

Her heart quickened its pace that also throbbed in her head. Mere hours earlier, when they'd spoken on the phone, he'd talked nonsense. About...how she'd slept beside him in his bed...their bodies warming each other's...their limbs tangled, like roots of the same tree, feeding from the same soil. He'd kept telling her how still, how quiet it had been as they'd lain together. His babble had been endless, his prattling on about how they'd share such intimacy, soon. How he'd hear the blood in her veins with his ear against her chest, his hand tracing the fan of her rib cage like it was an expanding leaf.

And after she'd sworn that he should commit himself to Bellevue, in the same breath she'd told him that she was worried about him. How strange that, now, she was the one who couldn't stop herself from fantasizing about the tall, light-eyed F.B.I. agent, who'd gotten on her nerves, and her case, from the start.

He truly was obsessed. Did she play him, or help him move pass this sick fascination he had with her?

What do I do?, she asked the night, stunned, closing her weary eyes. She pictured his face, tried seeing his reflection in the mirror of her mind. What she found scrambled her thoughts, wreaking havoc with her sense of stability. When had his mystique done this to her? How had intense dislike, because hatred had been reserved solely for Miguel, morphed into something bizarre? Something unimaginable taking over her emotions. Harlee halted, marveling how second guessing him had become easier now. For all of his sharpness, his deviousness, he was as transparent as glass.

And, being honest with herself, she had begun feeling him in every nerve ending.

"Harlee!"

His voice nearly had her jumping out of her skin. While it still crawled, she demanded, " _Mira! De aca para alla_! Stahl-your creepy habit of following me might earn you a bullet one of these days."

"Oh, you won't shoot me, Harlee..."

Wiping that smug look off his face made the palms of her hands itch.

She tried controlling how much she was trembling. His habit of relating his outrageous dreams to her was having a serious effect on her grip of reality. "Don't test me."

"You're upset," he judged, smiling in a very disturbing Cheshire catty way. His eyes rounded in innocence.

Harlee was his mouse.

Then she smiled, and inexplicably, the roles reversed.

"Wow. What gave it away? Me, with my hair standing on end like I just stuck my fingers into an electric socket? 'Cause that's what it feels like every time you think it's all fine and dandy sneaking up on me like you do!"

"I'm sorry, next time-"

"Don't let there be any more 'next times.'"

Stahl's laughter crackled in the air, as if sparks should fly out of his mouth next. "All this anger isn't just for me." Knowingly, he studied her with appraising eyes. Harlee felt them burn through her clothes, the initial shock ebbing, being replaced by pain flowing bone deep.

She said thickly, "What makes you so sick?"

"Me?" He was thoroughly sure of himself. "Or the crooks you rub shoulders with. Like those two in the bar and grill for instance."

Harlee fumed. "Of course _you_. Y'know...it's funny, you keep reminding me that I'm off the hook. You don't act like I am. You're bothering me more than before." She stopped walking with her back toward him, whirled around to square off. "What makes you think Julia is responsible for your partner's death?" She began backing him up against the nearest wall by a flower shop storefront that was now closed.

He nearly lost his breath as she kept forcing him back until his back was flush with the brick. "Not here! Let's go someplace more private."

"No, here! I want to know, because I have found out something! Something I don't want to think about!" Sounding ill she said, "But, I can't stop thinking. I've tried."

"Oh, yeah? Like what?" Smirking, he relished feeling her body pinning his. So close, so close. Ripe for the taking, but he controlled the animal instinct in him, forcing the nobler side of himself to gain the upper hand. "Like the mob funds her. They've been doing steady business for a very long time, Harlee. Nothing I've told you about her has been untrue, nothing made up."

In the back of her mind, a sad voice whispered, ' _I wish you had_..."

She choked on her words. "I've asked you before. Now, I'm asking you again. Are you seeking justice, or something else?" Her narrowed eyes were beacons in the interplay between light and dark on the deserted street. The moon, high overhead, protruded from a starless sky.

His hands encircled her wrists as her hands clenched the lapels of his suit. He smiled into her beautiful face, breathing in her brilliance, her fire. She recognized that look in his eyes and began drawing away, but not before his arms held her where she was. "Something else," he replied, his voice raspy, his minty breath, was that a hint of Ricola?, against her facial skin. "Something I thought too impossible to even conceive... _you_ , Harlee..."

She couldn't tear her eyes away from his that were filled with adulation, devotion, worship, not lust. He'd never stop feeling the way he did about her. Like a lovesick boy, he drew her in closer, delighting that she wasn't resisting him. He felt drunk suddenly, slurring his words, but meaning them more than any words he'd ever uttered before.

"I need to protect you, Harlee. Protect you from _him_ , and yourself..."

She knew who 'him' was, and defended him as she always did. "Woz-"

Stahl couldn't let her finish. Couldn't bear hearing the name of the man who'd sold his soul to corruption and infamy. Who was the downfall of many tortured people like this hard-boiled, yet impressionable woman. This woman whose moist, ripe lips, inches from his, he couldn't resist. Though he knew she might beat him senseless for even daring to try this. He curved his into a smile and spooned them with hers. His kiss hit her like being pushed into a pool brimming with Arctic-chilled water. A brilliant flash of light and delicious pain and violent longing jolted her, surging through her vibrating body, molding to his. It was he, not she, who gave ground, falling back.

"I...I shouldn't h-have done that," he stammered, his face whiter than the whites of his eyes.

Ignoring his conscientious whimper of remorse, Harlee grabbed the back of his head with both hands to pull his face and his lips back where they belonged...ravishing hers.

"Help me save Woz. I'll do whatever you want me to," she murmured against his smooth, soft lips.

His heart kept skipping beats as his forehead remained firmly in place, glued to hers. With eyes closed, he mumbled, "No. I'll do whatever it is _you_ want me to do. Just don't stop giving me this. Don't stop-please don't stop. Harlee, I need _you_. This need...it's all about _you_."

She covered his lips with hers, pulling him under.


	9. Chapter 9

Harlee silently thanked Woz again. If it weren't for him, she'd be facing a murder charge. Not that she'd actually killed anyone lately. Miguel would never count. The notorious mob boss, Bianchi wanted it to appear as though she had murdered Caroline in cold blood. Which was why seizing the surveillance tape had been vital. She smiled, thinking how she'd head-butted Bianchi's enforcer. At the time, after their heads had collided, for a split second, the worst pain ever in her head had been her reward for such a gutsy move.

Here at home, her head started pounding again. Her fingers traced the sore, sensitive area of her forehead where her head had banged into the block-like head of the blunt-faced, squat, bulldog-looking brute. She wondered if he was experiencing similar acute soreness. She hoped he was. Too bad that hurt couldn't transfer to Bianchi also. He was no man, he was not even a monster, way beyond that. He was malignancy in a suit and tie.

Harlee stood, quietly observing Cristina. The teen was poring over homework her mother knew was all about musical theory on her laptop. This was what it was all about. Seeing that her daughter succeeded in this dog-eat-dog world. She was a star, blessed with God-given talent. Nothing was going to keep Cristina from realizing her hopes and dreams. She'd taken care of Cristina's biggest threat. Miguel. Perhaps a new threat existed, now, in the form of the mob boss. Harlee vowed that no matter what it took, regardless of what she might have to do, Bianchi would never do what he had orchestrated happen to Caroline.

"Mom?"

As if Harlee felt for a foreign object for the first time, she gently fingered her hurting head. Squeezing her eyes shut, she sighed and tried hard not to give into the dizziness fluttering about her skull.

"Mom!" Cristina tried again, giving her mother a concerned look. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, Baby, I'm fine," she lied, through her perfectly, straight, dazzling white teeth. Putting a hand to her head, Harlee swooned, but somehow kept herself from falling down into the couch inches behind her.

"You don't look so good, Mom..."

The unseen spy, secretly patched-in disagreed. His Latina beauty never disappointed, her appearance never failing to please him. In another place, far away from the Santos' living room, Stahl whispered, "You're perfect, my angel." He licked his lips, yearning to feel them melded with his again, thirsting for their nectar, the essence of ambrosia.

He'd gone into a department store, knowing that the saleswoman hadn't believed him when he said he'd needed to find just the right lipstick for his girl. He didn't look like the lipstick-buying type. What the sales associate didn't know was when he'd hit upon just the right one. The one he'd tasted on Harlee's lips, he was buying it for himself. Alone, he would savor it, applying it to his own lips. Holding the lipstick to his nostrils to inhale as deeply as possible. Run his tongue over his lips, have it linger on his bottom lip, all the while inhaling and conjuring up his fantasy honey in the catacombs of his eccentric mind.

"Just tired, Baby," Harlee again justified.

Cristina got up from her impromptu workspace, making her way over to where her mother had slowly sunk to the couch. With eyes closed, Harlee felt her daughter's presence, letting it comfort her.

"What can I get you?"

Harlee squinted an eye open to look at her kindhearted, attentive child. "Some tea would be nice."

"Sure, Mom, what kind? We have lots and lots of your favorite teas. Which one should I make?"

Not a daunting decision. What would make her feel better? Distraught and bone tired. Smiling faintly at Cristina, Harlee replied, "Lemon Balm, sweetie. I'll have that."

Her daughter wasted no time, darting off to the kitchen. Once the water was sitting on the stove, Cristina removed the tea box from the cabinet, then set about hunting up her mother's favorite mug, the one that proclaimed in Spanish: _La propiedad de la mejor madre en el mundo entero._ Which was exactly how she felt about her mom. Despite how intense Harlee could be when it came to parenting, she was the best mother in the whole world.

The water on the boil, Cristina introduced it to the tea bag at the bottom of the mug. Hot water whistled as it slide into the mug. Steam rose like a diaphanous cloud, bathing her nose in wet heat. Smiling, she asked, "Want honey?"

Their invisible infiltrator nodded, watching Harlee as she languished on the couch. "Yes, I do want you, Honey..."

"Sure," Harlee said.

There was no white sugar in the house; not any. Crystallized sucrose, extracted from sugarcane or sugar beets was like crack cocaine to the Santos women. Honey was their natural sweetener of choice, but in lieu of it, they were okay with monk fruit.

"Not too sweet," Harlee warned, feeling how good it was to zone-out on this soft couch, like floating on a glassy calm sea with a refreshing breeze lapping at the skin of her face and teasing her shimmery hair in voluminous barrel curls. And...Stahl, holding the straw in her umbrella drink as she sipped a little of her mojito, without the sugar, through it.

 _What! The Freak_!

What was _he_ doing in her pie in the sky daydream? She wouldn't let herself believe it. Did she miss _him_? Just because he hadn't contacted her once this week? She should be rejoicing. Why wasn't she? No-

She refused to admit...and told herself: _You can't be serious_!

The thought snuck in anyway... _I miss him_.

Harlee's eyes popped open, startled.

"Here you are, Mom." Cristina had the tea on a dainty stoneware serving tray. Lemon wedges were neatly cut on a plate with a sienna border. "Sorry...didn't mean to startle you."

The mug was emitting steam like a smokestack. Harlee took up the mug, bringing it under a nose and just breathed in the goodness. Her nerves unfurling, losing some of their edge already.

Blowing on the tea's surface first, Harlee then warily sipped. "Ah...nice." She repeated the steps, feeling the effects of the tea wind through her like a home remedy handed down through generations. The lemon was mild, the honey mellow, rolling over her taste buds, delighting them.

"Mom..." Cristinia watched her mother thoughtfully as her detective mom wound down, mulling over what she felt she had to say. "You've been kinda down lately."

"Have I? Really?"

"Yeah," Cristinia vouched. "And I know why."

Harlee's eyes gazed at her daughter like twin half moons above the rim of the mug. "Why?" she innocently asked.

"You miss my dad," Cristina said confidently.

Harlee bit back the gag wanting to escape her throat. "Oh, you think that don't you."

Nodding, her daughter said, "Yes. Even though you gave him money, paid him off to get him out of our lives, you didn't think it all the way through, Mom. You didn't count on remembering that he wanted us to be a family. Deep down, you want it too. You just can't admit it. You miss him."

Ears at the other end of the spyware flash drive strained to hear what Harlee's response would be.

Sadness saturated Harlee's eyes. Cristina, for all of her innocence, was the personification of a hope long-cherished that one day she could be the recipient of a father's love. Of course, Cristina deserved a father, which should have never been Miguel. As much as she loved her daughter, Harlee would never, even when Cristina was a mother herself, tell her the sort of man her father had truly been.

"I only admit to being thankful for someone as wonderful as you are, Cristina, that you're my beautiful, talented child. Baby, you're my world. I can't say any of this enough. I'll do anything I have to, to insure that you thrive. That nothing stands in the way of you having the best life you're meant to have."

Her daughter didn't mean to smirk, but she couldn't help herself. When her mom got like this, it was just a little too over the top. All this police work wasn't helping her mom cope with this life she led being a hopefully normal teenager. Thinking she knew what her mom really needed, Cristina said, "Maybe one day, you'll change your mind about my dad and want him to come back. I think it'd make you very happy, Mom."

Inside her head, where murky images stained by blood sweat and tears plagued her, Harlee shouted: ' _No, Cristina, that's never happening. I killed your horrible father because a scumbag like that didn't deserve to live. I took him out! I'll never be sorry I did!'_

"Baby, how's that homework coming?"

"Finished. Look, Mom, I know you don't want to talk about this, but..." Cristina hesitated, deciding keeping this from her mother no longer felt right. "There's this guy. An investigator from this law office. He's helping me...trying to find out where my dad is. Where he's gone. I want to know. And I think you want to know too."

Stahl caved, peering at the laptop screen, practically toppling out of the chair he sat in.

Suddenly the tight-knit mother-daughter conversation veered, taking an unexpected, violent turn. The hairs on the back of Harlee's neck rose. She felt her heart lurch, throbbing within her chest. The muscles in her face tightened again. Keeping cool, her voice level, she asked, " _What guy_? _Which_ law office? Helping you do _what_ , Cristina?" Panic flooded her body. Entrapment engulfed her. Her thoughts mingled with hysteria on the verge of spiraling out of control. "Cristina-what are you talking about?"

"This guy-"

"What guy?"

Cristina didn't get to finish shrugging. Harlee hit her with that question again- " _What guy_!"

The teen, looking sheepish now, clammed up, sorry she'd said anything.

"Cristina, are you doing something behind my back you shouldn't be doing!" Harlee had shot up from the couch, standing akimbo, grilling her daughter with prosecutor eyes.

Stahl's eyes raked over Harlee's body greedily, annoyed that he wasn't there, at her home, having her pin him down on that couch as his hands ravaged that magnificent head of hair of hers. What was this woman doing, wasting her life, rolling in the mud with filthy cops like Woz? She had real star quality; she should be in pictures, or T.V., at least. Cristina could be the daughter of a famous mom instead of a mother who might get herself killed one day. And for what? Making the world safer for bigger and better criminals?

"What a waste," Stahl said aloud, agitated. He keyed in on Cristina, who was talking again.

"Mom, I'm only trying to help!" Cristina defended, looking more upset than Harlee now.

"Cristinia-tell me! I want the truth." She spoke slowly, deliberately. "What's this man's name?"

"I c-can't remember," she stammered, trying hard to remember as her thoughts whirled.

"He's from a law office?"

Her daughter nodded.

"What's the name of this law office?"

"He never said," Cristina said, cowed. She didn't quit trying though, trying to remember what the clean-looking blue-eyed man's name was. Wait, hadn't he given her his card. Where was it? In her bag? She started off to get it, but Harlee wasn't through with her. Oh, no; not nearly.

"What does he look like?" Harlee asked in her no-nonsense tone of voice reserved for interrogating hardened criminals.

Cristina wished her mother would drink more of her tea, lots more, and chill all the way out. Why was she using her freaking-out tone of voice?

Stahl waited with bated breath for Cristina's description.

"He's tall, maybe six feet at least. His hair is this weird sort of dirty blond. He looks like he could be farmer way out in the Midwest. He smells very clean, oh, and his breath is usually minty."

Cristinia would be her mother's youthful hair snow white. It felt as if little woolly spiders, wearing cleats were parading up and down her flesh, making her skin crawl.

"Oh, and he's old, like maybe forty, maybe even older," Cristina tacked on, trying to sound cooperative. Her huge eyes shone like polished mirrors.

Unseen to mother's and daughter's eyes, Stahl was frowning. "I am _not_ forty! I'm _only_ thirty-nine, young lady!" Now that he'd been properly offended, he sniffed at the youngster's effrontery. He knew what was coming next. Cristina's momma was no dummy.

Harlee cleared her throat and looked her child sternly in the eyes. "Cristina, I want you to listen to me, and listen to me good. I don't want you contacting this man anymore. You know better than this. I don't care what he's promising you. Break off all contact with him."

"But, Ma!"

"Cristina-listen and do what I say. This man is taking advantage of you. He'll ask for money, lots of it, to keep doing what you want him to!"

"He hasn't asked for a cent, Mom. He just wants to help because he knows how important this is to me. Please, Mom-"

Harlee roared back, "Cristina, do you trust me?"

"Yes, Mom. Of course."

"Then, trust me on this...please! Never see this man again."

Heaving a cumbersome sigh, Cristina acquiesced, meeting her mother's plaintive facial expression. "Okay, Mom. I won't."

"Thank you. Baby, I know it's hard. Losing contact with your father, but trusting this man to help you isn't the way to go. Trust me. It's not."

Cristina came alongside her mother, put her arm around her shoulders and squeezed. "I trust you, Mom..."

Stahl trusted that the next time he saw Harlee, she'd read him the riot act, and then rip him a nice, big new one. And then take fiendish delight ripping his heart out.

Could be fun, he thought.


	10. Chapter 10

No words had ever had more of a devastating effect. The squad, looking at her malevolently, hardened their faces along with their eyes. _She-she_ was the informant! Working with the F.B.I.! Selling them out! Thrashing her within an inch of her life was too good for her! Silently, bets were being made on her not making it out of this freezer alive. It was scalding in here, now. The heat descending like fire.

" _You_!" Loman shouted. That picture of Woz and Donnie Pomp scintillated within his mind's eye. His eyes fastened on Harlee like a cobra locking eyes with a mongoose. "This is some kind of a joke, right?" Muttering under his breath, he swore, "It's gotta be!"

"It's no joke," Woz confirmed, locking eyes with Loman. "She had no choice in the matter. It was she cooperating, or us going down." That threat had never gone away. Stahl was a menace that wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. The look on Woz's face brooked no dissension in the ranks. As much as he'd hated learning about Harlee's involvement with the Fed's, he had come to acknowledge that she'd been put in a spot between a rock and a hard place.

Over the angry-sounding bombination, he roared, "Settle down, People! settle down!"

Her bald confession, yanking him off the hook, had shot her back with the speed of light into his good graces. Even so, if she ever thought of keeping anything as big as what she'd concealed from him, ever again, he would be obligated to kick her out on her lovely derriere. Banishment happened even in the best of families.

"And you asked _me_ to trust _you_ ," Tess voiced, wailing her complaint, cutting Harlee down with cruel eyes along with a stony facial expression. Absolutely shocked, she pushed back a few loose hair strands floating about her face. "You win! You're the Queen of Liars!"

Tufo was speechless, color draining from his dark complexion, giving his scowly, street-wise face an ashen aspect. His scowl grew even more intense the more he stared Harlee down. fulminated within him.

Just because the chick was a gorgeous knockout, an amazing beauty coupled with brains, didn't make everything she did as right as rain! Her rolling over on them! No! Oh-no!

Carlos couldn't stop throwing his hands up and bleating, "I can't believe this! I can't believe this! What the freak _is this_!" He wanted to wring Harlee's neck, but knew that if he even flinched a muscle at her, Woz would get in-between the clash, and lay him out. A Woz beat-down was something not even the toughest brute walked away from without hefty damage.

"You _think_ you know people!" Tufo finally bickered, setting even harder eyes on Harlee. "What-what's the payoff? You walk in exchange for us?" he spat.

Woz or no Woz, there was a definite sea change. No longer was this a crew of distinct individuals, instead, they'd coalesced into a cohesive mob, ready to pounce on her, tear her apart. Sensing the hostility, Harlee eyed the doorway, calculating how much time she had to bolt out of there. Part of her advised her to get out fast; another part told her to stay put. Hold her ground. They were invested in one another. Maybe they'd understand what she'd done, given time.

Okay, maybe lots of time would have to go by before they could look at her without seeing deep inferno red.

On her wavelength, Woz barked, "Nobody's layin' a finger on her. All you need to know is that me and her've got the situation under control. We're not losin' our heads. No one's gonna get hung out to dry, offered up as a sacrifice. Is that clear! We're in this together! _All_ of us. Nothing's changed. We're family...like she said. We're getting through this rough patch together. Got that!"

Their master's voice, filled with passion and plea, quelled the tense situation momentarily, but even Woz knew it might be better if Harlee cleared out so he could have a heart-to-heart with his minions minus her agitating presence. That idea sparked an epiphany. Not saying a word to her, he high-signed, visually hinting that she should depart.

He'd smooth things over, and they'd go from there, more solidified, more galvanized, putting secrets, lies and innuendos far behind them. He grimaced slightly, thinking that. This would in no way be easy. The 'family' was at its wit's end.

"Harlee," Woz said, "I'll be in touch."

She didn't have to be tipped off twice. Not saying anything, nor looking at any of her teammates, except for Woz, she blew out of there like the wind.

* * *

She trudged along, down the length of her street, wary. She had to be these days. Bianchi was serious. More bodies were going to fall and one of them might just be hers. She needed eyes in the back of her head. Or...Harlee shuddered. Cristina! Never had the thought of what she did for a living endangering her daughter smack Harlee across her eyes. She scolded herself for having patronized Cristina earlier, telling her she'd be all right instead of agreeing to take her and herself away from here, the heart of danger.

Harlee was so absorbed in her own troubling thoughts over mob retaliation that when his voice reached her ears, she nearly jumped out of her velvety smooth skin. Fear pounded in her veins and the dreaded name throbbed in her head.

 _Bianchi_!

The owner of the voice stepped out from behind the oak tree's massive trunk and locked eyes with his cinnamon, blond streaked-haired obsession. As he smiled coyly at Harlee he asked, "Miss me?"

She almost crumpled, obliging him to catch her before she spilled to the pavement. He held her in his arms, feeling her tremble, awestruck. Although he'd faked being a recovering addict at that rehab meeting with Curtis 'Caddie' Deville, there was no faking his ironclad absorption and mania with her. Indeed, she'd left stretch marks on his heart, with many more in the making.

Recovering quickly from her momentarily lapse in balance, she tried wriggling out of his grasping embrace. Truth be told, as rocky as she felt, she wasn't trying too hard. He held her in place, liking her just where she was. "Stahl..." she hissed, feeling his eyes raze her lips. His hands on her body was like an out of body experience. His eyes...were filled with everything that had her wondering what he was really like.

"Is everything all right?" he asked, half-releasing her, half-holding on to her because he'd missed the feel of her languishing in his arms. Arms that ached to hold her so tightly, she would gasp. Not that he wished to hurt her like that. He'd memorized all of her facial movements. It was just that his compulsion warped his brain, telling him he must do nothing less than possess her.

He had memorized all of her facial movements, cataloged her sighs, her tones. She was the danger he could not turn tail and run from. Run? He wanted to run straight into her.

Something about her grounded him, for reasons he couldn't understand.

"Everything's fine," she lied, thinking back to the horror of the freezer. She might not be able to work with her 'family' again and that thought was agony. All because of this pest of a man dogging her every step. Always showing up to harass her; she blinked because... She'd had a fleeting thought...a nagging thought. One that she didn't want to think, but was thinking about more and more. Especially when she did indeed feel vulnerable.

Robert Stahl was a very handsome man, actually. Handsomer than James Nava, but so much darker, despite the Fed's coloring. So much more seductive. How dark was the darkness he harbored inside him, if what she'd seen of the videotaping was any indication? What really lurked in the recesses of his devious mind? Dare she find out? Were these the kind of men that enticed her? Men...like Miguel? Men like...this one, tempting her. Driving sanity clean out of her. There was nothing sane about her fancying Robert Stahl.

Momentarily dazed, she stared, abstracted, forgetting that she still clung to him.

He wasn't about to surrender her, wrapping his arms around her more protectively.

"Just leave me alone," Harlee pleaded, possessively caged in his arms that a windbreaker enveloped.

This was a switch. So, he owned more than suits.

 _If only I could,_ nearly spilled from Stahl's lips. Lips yearning to taste hers again, to marinate in their torrid juices.

The junkie in him laughed, worse than Curtis Deville had at him, back at that addict's rundown apartment where Stahl had left a nickle bag on purpose.

Before she realized what he was doing with her, he had backed her up against her front door. His hands cupped her heart-shaped face as his eyes worshiped it. "Harlee," he murmured.

She shook her head lightly from side to side, but one of his hands, at the base of her throat, held her head firmly, not too firmly, in place. "No. Don't. Not here. Not now," she plied, stroking his hand with her fingertips.

"I want to return the favor," he said, coming in for the strike.

"The neighbors," she murmured.

"Beware the publicity of social media," he affably teased, giving her leeway to maneuver.

He permitted her to fumble in her purse for house keys, he breathing hard, down her neck as she rammed them into the door lock. She was just about to turn the knob, when the shot rang out.

He slumped against her like a ton of concrete.

"Stahl!" Harlee bellowed, instinctively dropping to a crouch, tugging him along with her. Her hand at her service revolver, she repeated his name, then saw a glaring trickle of blood rilling down his left cheek. Her fingers flowed to the redness; he never stirred.

A silhouette lengthened against the front door as Harlee prepared to squeeze off her shot.

The door creaked open and she yelled, "Take another step and you're dead!"

"Oh, really? And I thought we were friends again..." Woz stuck his head in, his smarmy smile hitting Harlee between the eyes.

"You crazy cop! I could have shot you just now," she cried.

"What happened to him?" Woz asked. "ODed?" Tongue in cheek, he chuckled. "You're just too much woman for him, Harl."

"Like you don't know," she fired back. "You just shot him!"

"Not me," he retorted innocently.

Harlee gawped at him fiercely. Woz took up the slack and said, "One of your new Bianchi buddies' handiwork, most likely..." He gave the fallen agent a look-see from where he stood. "He dead?"

Locating a pulse, and as faint as it was, she shook her head like she was livid with the world. Woz had his phone out.

"What's the emergency?" the 911 operator demanded.

In a gust of breath, Woz snapped, "Agent down!" He recited Harlee's address as he sized up her stormy eyes, she cradling Stahl's head in her lap. "If your boyfriend doesn't make it, we're all off the hook."

Glaring at him hard, Harlee said, "He'll be replaced, and the next one they send won't be as clueless as this one." She kept checking his pulse, noting that the stronger she held his hand, the stronger it became. Quietly, in her mind, she bargained with this paradoxical man.

" _Don't-don't-just don't_ ," you hear me. " _Not until I've figured you out_."


	11. Chapter 11

Only grazed by he bullet, Robert Stahl lived. The projectile had scored a lengthy grooved along the side of his head, but after a night's stay at the nearest hospital to Harlee's, he'd been cleared, and was released. Guess who'd stayed by his side all during the night? Why had she stayed, ignoring Woz's confused, disapproving looks? Looks that she'd pretended not to see? The man that had lain with his head bandaged in the bed, hadn't been a F.B.I. agent, trying to get her for her crimes.

No. He'd been a man hurt, one wounded, vulnerable, which had been all she'd seen as she'd kept watch over him at bedside. The part of her heart that'd begun feeling something warm and fuzzy for him overruled Woz's criticism and off-color teasing. Not at all strange that Stahl had murmured, muttered, whispered, cried out her name in the throes of some vivid dream or nightmare. She had credited that to his deeply embedded fascination with her. As she'd sat with him, wondering to herself, going over his ruggedly handsome features with mellow, appreciative eyes, Harlee hadn't been able to deny herself the liberty of running the backs of her fingers against the smooth planes of his small-pored cheeks. When he'd said he was thirsty, hers were the fingers that held the straw to his lips. Hers were the lips telling him that everything was going to be all right.

And here he was, in her home, demanding that she roll over on Julia. Like old times. And she had no other choice, but to submit. Why? Because she owed him. A position she eschewed being in, but he had helped. Had tied up a very loose end with Bianchi. This was his idea of payback, for starters. 'You wash my back. I'll wash yours.'

 _He'd just love that; the two of us bathing together_ , Harlee thought, her mind wrinkling along with her nose. And yet, that other part of her that was drawn to him tingled at the idea.

Stahl nudged the little recording device on the countertop closer to her. He repeated the same thing he'd told her earlier. "You can't keep secrets from me, Harlee. When are you going to realize that?"

If she only knew how he know about these secrets. Harlee would have hung him out to dry.

"Here's a news flash. You're freaking me out. It's like I can't make a moved without you-boom-blowing up in my face."

Stahl thought he'd say something smart, but chose not to. Instead, he eyed her, wishing she would touch him again the way she had when she'd asked that favor of him. "It'll all be over soon." Even the way he'd said that left him exposed. He didn't want this game of cat and mouse to end. He liked seeing her at her wits' end. Even though they were even now, he still felt he owed her for staying with him. Oh, yes. He knew she'd never left his side despite the grogginess and disorientation he'd had to endure hospitalized.

He stepped around the kitchen island, coming to stand behind her. Her wild, unruly hair beckoned to his fingertips, imploring that he entangle his fingers in her silky lattice. Harlee closed her eyes, anticipating his touch, wondering if he would read her mind. Lately, that's all he seemed to be able to do. How did he know so much?

Stahl smiled behind her head and said, "What if I told you a secret of mine?"

Harlee's eyes shot open. The tone of his voice and what he'd said enticing her. "That's your call..."

He settled a hand on each of her shoulders, gratified that as his right hand scaled the side of her neck his fingertips absorbed her tremors, which she rued. "I'm indebted to you."

Time froze between them, all sense of it suspended.

Her supple neck twisted in his limber hand as she turned to face him. His smile flicked across his lips that quivered. Her eyes saw true conviction in his eyes. She marveled at never having seen them looking this nonpredatory. Thoroughly surprised, she asked, "Really? For what?"

"You didn't have to stay with me in the hospital. I knew you were there; you never left my side. You didn't have to, yet you did. Why?"

She allowed herself to absorb his question that struck her as being not as simple as he'd made it sound. "No F.B.I. agent's going to croak on my watch," she replied. "Just making sure you pulled through." Although it had sounded off-the-cuff, she knew he wasn't buying it. Why would he, knowing that her having feelings for him had begun to show.

"Whatever reason you did it, I owe you."

"No. You don't," she insisted, shutting her eyes again the moment he began cinching her throat tenderly with his fingers worshipping her flesh. Her protest died on her lips the moment his melded with hers. He treasuring her compliant sigh when it reached his ears. Against his lips, Harlee mumbled, "So does this mean Woz, me and the crew get a free pass?"

Drugged by her responsiveness, Stahl obediently uttered huskily, "That depends on what happens..."

"You mean..." She reached for him as she rose from the stool and her hands caressed his rock-hard pectorals, upper and lower. His hand around her neck eased its way to her collarbone, his fingers fanning out over it.

"I mean," he said so softly, she thought she was hearing wrong. "I need you to be on my side, Harlee, 'cause you want to be. Not because I'm coercing you. I want us to be friends..."

Her nose nuzzled his cheek, close to his mouth. "With benefits is what you mean."

He pressed the pads of his fingers more firmly against her incredibly soft skin and sighed. "The benefit being, we work together so we both get what we want." He reciprocated the nuzzle, burying his nose into her cheek, completely at home. "I'd rather you be my friend. Not my enemy, Harlee."

"I misjudged you," she whispered, finding his lips again, pressing into them heavily.

"I misjudged you too," he gasped, his mind reeling, drinking his fill. Brutal honesty, never tasting so good.


	12. Chapter 12

"You are..." Harlee's voice as disjointed thoughts in her mind spun. What was she doing, still being with him in this room? Seeing the anger, pain and shock shuffling in the pupils of his eyes like clothes tumbling in a dryer. "Sick." Shaking her head, she said with a look of contempt, "I've said this before. Now, I'm saying it again. You. Need. Help."

His hungry, troubled eyes fell squarely on her. He opened, then closed his mouth, opened it again, not speaking. His voice shook when he said, "I need _you_. You're who I need."

"No," she snapped, backing away from him as he leaned against the shelf that ran the length of the conference room windows with an arm extended as his fingers grasped for her. "I mean _professional_ help. Get this, and get this good. Release Espada. Leave Julia alone. _And_ , stop messing with my family. All of us get to walk away...like you _never_ happened." She took another breath and vowed, "'Cause if you don't, I swear, you're goin' down, man. I'll use this against you, so help me." She waved the zip drive in his face, watching Stahl watch her. She judged he looked as though he'd been conquered, but she didn't want to feel cocksure about that. He was a con man, one who wore designer suits and never had a hair out of place.

She didn't want to dwell on his physical attractiveness; it only confused her.

And then, for a moment, a frisson of panic registered in Stahl's face. That zing disappeared just as soon as it'd appeared, causing Harlee to ponder what it meant. Stahl, for one terrible moment, feared she'd found out about his contact with Cristina. But when Harlee continued, he knew his bit of dirty tricks with her daughter was something she still knew nothing about. If she ever found out, he knew he was a dead man...

 _"You're_ responsible for your partner's murder- _not_ Julia! In your head, she's solely to blame. You're mostly to blame. You wanted the affair with your partner's wife to continue. Like I keep having to remind you. You. Are. Sick."

"I...I...have...a...a problem," he stammered, looking adrift in a sea of lost horizons. If she'd only let him touch her, the way she'd let him in her apartment. That night seemed like something that had happened in his imagination.

She, peeling several of his layers off methodically, Stahl was staring at her blankly, but wheels still turned in his head. Even when his mind was thrown into a quandary, it never paused as it calculated his next move. What little color remaining on his face, siphoned off by her relentless verbal assault, made him appear ashen.

Nodding, Harlee again agreed. "Yes, you do. Do yourself a favor, get therapy. You're only hurting yourself the longer you deny you don't need it."

"I...I...c-can't!" he insisted.

"Why can't you?" Harlee badgered, unconsciously moving nearer to him.

Stahl was aware that she'd lessened the distance between them. "I'm a-afraid," he gritted out between his dazzlingly white teeth. "I go to a shrink, it's a career-ruiner."

She glared at him incredulously. "So your career, a blotch against it, is more important than your mental health? You're kidding me, right?"

"You don't understand," he mumbled.

"What am I missing here?" Harlee asked, seeing more of the same of what she'd seen in his eyes reappear. If she'd had a feather, she would've been able to knock him over with it.

"If any of this gets out...my career with the F.B.I. goes up in smoke. My job's all I have now. I can't let it go down the drain. That can't happen, Harlee. I won't let it happen. Without this job, I'm nothing."

She snorted and he saw rejection in her eyes. "You've been telling yourself that for so long, it's affecting all your other decisions. The worst one to date is betraying your partner's trust, which cost him his life. I'm not saying therapy can fix that. Of course it can't, but it could fix you, Stahl. And you need fixing. You do, you know. I'm not just saying that to make you feel any worse."

"Could you say something that could make me feel better?" he beseeched, pleading for her to throw him a bone, with sad, desperate eyes. He knew he looked weak, but he didn't care. Out of weakness often came strength.

"Like what?" Harlee threw out.

"Like... _you_ forgive me..." He reached for her hand and she allowed him to hold it. "Don't stop being my friend, even though I don't deserve your friendship." He trembled a little, then his admission flowed. "I am what you say I am. Sick. Very sick. I need help. I've been in denial for years. If I hadn't met you, I would keep right on lying to myself. Insisting that there's nothing wrong with me. I am...erratic...manipulative..."

He was on a confession roll, leaving Harlee speechless, teetering between empathetic and dubious, wondering just how sincere this was. She saw tears standing in his eyes, huddling at the border of his lower eyelids. Seeing him cry? Would that be what it would take before she truly believed him?

It occurred to Stahl that she had every reason _not_ to believe him. Was spying on her a display of honesty? Forcing her to wear a wire a show of good faith?

"Ever since his death...living with myself has been hell. A hell I thought I could escape from, telling myself that I wasn't responsible. It was Julia Ayres fault. Julia Ayres' negligence killed him. Not my selfishness, my obsessive lust, my pathetic compulsion for justification. And then, you came along, and here you are...demanding I come clean. I become a whole person, and quit being the useless shell I've become."

"Only you can take the first steps," she roused, meshing her fingers with his.

"Take them with me..." He poured sincerity into each word. "You stayed with me in the hospital. You got me through. Help get me through this, Harlee. Please. You're the woman I've searched for my whole life. Never thought I'd find. My sickness showed you and side of myself I've tried so hard to keep hidden all these years. With you...I can overcome what I've become...a parasite...a miscreant.

"I know that with you, I can change. Take this chance with me, Harlee. I won't blame you if walk out that door, never wanting to see me again, but knowing the woman you are, the kind of woman who believes in second chances, help me get on the road to recovery. You're a beaut of an incentive."

While squeezing his hand, she said, "I...I...wish I could...but, but..." She didn't have the heart to tell him, although the idea screamed at her. She didn't trust him, if only she could. He was a lost soul begging for her to help him get well, and all she could think of was how duplicitous he could be. His constant deceit and callous disregard for her emotional states had left a bad taste in her heart.

Her hands rose to his face and she kissed his hungry lips tenderly, despite his wanting more. He hugged her tightly, his arms like a vise. His hands were plastered against the small of her back. It was 'the more' that she feared giving him. Prying herself free from the confinement he imposed, she held up the zip drive before his face. Tears burned hot in her eyes. She sounded breathless, protesting, "I'm sorry. So very sorry, but I..." She swiped tears away from her face, temporarily blinded by the abundance of them. "I can't-"

She broke from his embrace, turned on her heel, not daring to look back as she left the conference room. The clack-clack-clack of her high heels reverberating off the walls and resounding in Stahl's ears.

"Harlee, I can't let you go. You're in my blood. I'll never let you go. I can't. I want what you want. What's real, and true," he breathed, shutting his eyes. "I don't objectify you, not anymore." His nostrils trembled when he said, "I love you."


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: This is _not_ what's going to happen, of course, in the series, but I am exercising fanfic poetic license, fashioning what I'd like to come about. Thanks for reading!

* * *

And there he was, just as she'd figured he would be. Although her pain from the shower of glass shards was still sharp, and her mind and heart raw, Harlee had her eyes riveted to Stahl as he shoved the shovel again and again into the cold, dark ground. He flicked the dirt he unearthed heedlessly behind himself as he attacked the grave with such vehemence, she could feel his mania. The more he whacked away the more palpable his frenzy felt. Following several seconds more of his maddened pace, she saw him abruptly stop digging. Harlee rolled her eyes; her heart seemed to pause in mid-beat. The entire graveyard seemed to shudder, shrouded in surrealism.

He was leaning way down into the pit. When he straightened up, with a look of bafflement, he was holding something. Harlee strained to make out what his fingers held. The small object glinted dully. She gasped as her hand flew to her mouth. Momentarily distracted from his find, Stahl looked over to where she hid behind a tombstone.

Had he seen her? She counted on it being dark enough to cloak her and gave it another minute before she counted to three. and then chanced having a look.

He was examining what he'd found again, scrutinizing the discovery from every angle. And, she thought she was still flying under his radar until she heard:

"I know you're there, Harlee. You need to come out. I need a little help here..."

He sure had that right, she thought. He needed so much help, he would keep a psychiatrist, therapist and psychoanalyst busy for the rest of their lives. She also thought that if she stayed where she was, he'd lose the idea that she was here.

One of many things that drove her up the wall about him was his bulldog-tenacious persistence. But what he'd perpetrated with Cristina, her flesh and blood made her want to turn him inside out, starting with grabbing the back of his throat and ending with his feet sticking out of his mouth. A bizarre idea, but as she crouched in the dark with bated breath, she smiled.

"Harlee, if you make me come over there where you are, I get to punch you in the gut this time."

She sighed heavily, wishing she could just blink her eyes and the colossal headache in suit and tie would disappear. Beads of sweat, a cold sweat, broke out across her forehead. If she slunk away into the night, would he come after her with that pickax of a shovel he was wielding? How had he learned of this grave? This unhallowed ground where Miguel lay a little less than six feet under?

She shot up from behind the tombstone, glaring at him, hating his guts with everything she had.

"Come over here," Stahl ordered, looking out-of-sorts, like someone had pissed all over that tailored suit of his.

Folding her arms over her chest and blowing a wisp of her hair out of her eyes, she snapped, "You're still not safe for me to be around. And if you don't know that-I'm telling you. Punching you was nothing compared to the beat-down you deserve from me!"

His skin prickled at the angry sound of her voice which shook as if its shakiness imbued it with even greater power. Unconsciously, he licked his lips, exhilarated by its sirenic force. He equated that temper of hers with her passion. He wanted what she promised him; a Harlee beat-down. An answer to his sick fantasies, as if she didn't know. His blue eyes were electric hot. "I'm holding what looks like a tooth." He squinted at what looked to be a molar, he supposed. "Whose tooth is this, Harlee?"

A gong was going off in her head, a warning ringing that she should've been heeding. Instead of listening to the internal warning, she found herself falling victim to his virile charisma and that freaky, overwhelming look of obsession crying out to her. Demanding that she succumb, feeling herself drawn to him, her nemesis and catnip at the same time. She conjured up the memory of her belting him a good one, but going over that again wasn't bolstering her resolve to beware. Keep away. This man was all shades of dangerous.

"How should I know?"

Instead of baiting her, he asked her again, more gently. "Saperstein's?"

That dead man's face flickered before her withering eyes, a sad, impotent memory.

Before she thought to censor herself, her mouth took over and she spoke Miguel's name before she even realized she'd told Stahl the very thing he was never supposed to find out. Here she was spoonfeeding him her darkest secret as if he actually had a right hearing the truth.

"No-no-I mean-no! Not Miguel..." She had all the appearance of someone having been smack between the eyes and shoved in front of a speeding car, caught in its headlights.

Stahl smiled that cagey, now 'I've got you' infuriating smile of his. It touched her, leaving her cold. But then, like lightning, it struck and vanished. Instead of sounding his usual smug self, he replied, "It's good he's dead."

"I told you it isn't Miguel in that grave," Harlee hissed through her teeth, but even she knew she wasn't fooling him, only herself, if she thought he bought her bald lie.

"I want it to be him," Stahl murmured, staring at her with unbridled vehemence mixed with excitement on his face as she stood gazing down at him, scowling. "I need it to be him." He gazed up at her, helplessly, willing her to come down here with him in the same hell.

"Like I said, Stahl, you're too sick for words. I don't know who you're trying to dig up," Harlee badgered, trembling noticeably, which she knew he didn't miss. "But it's _not_ the man you tricked my daughter into thinking you could find, and then resorted to actually impersonating him!" She took out her service revolver, but held off pointing the muzzle at his head.

As though this was a dream sequence, Stahl just started talking, uncontrollably.

" _If_ this is him, like I say, good riddance. If you think that I've figured it out that you killed him, I don't know that. Not a thing. The only thing I know is that with him out of the way, it gives you breathing room because he can't insert himself into your life anymore. And that suits _me_ just fine; it's a win-win. A win for you; a win for me." His eyes had gone from electric hot to wildfire hot, smoldering with desire champing to be released. " _If_ you took him out, I'm applauding."

Again, his strange, sensual effect he had over her pushed the words out of her mouth. "I killed him, snapped his neck. He vowed to abuse our daughter, and me. So I did it." The agony in her voice misrepresented the closure she felt.

If she wouldn't come to him, he'd come to her. He cast the shovel aside, and climbing up out of the hole he embraced her, his arms taking her into them, wrapping around her shaking body and holding on to her tightly, as though if he let her go, they'd both disappear off the face of the earth.

"I'll never tell a soul, Harlee. No one, never," he swore.

She couldn't help herself, she thought, burying her face into the worsted fabric of his high-twist suit. "I should be punching you instead of hugging you," she moaned, shocked, yet relieved. Canoodling with the enemy, instead of ripping him a new one after what he'd done... How was that for schizoid?

"What am I doing?" she mumbled, baffled, but not making any attempt to break free of his possessive grip.

"What we should have been doing all along. Joining forces, rolling in the deep. Like that song of Adele's, always having each other's back, being there for each other, no matter what. Harlee, like I've said. I know I'm a sick man. A crazy one, but I don't want to ever be away from you. It's not about Julia Ayres; that was just an excuse. It's all about you. I need you, Harlee. Love you isn't close enough to what I feel for you."

While sucking in a deep breath, she whispered, "Do you mean that? We join forces? I got your back? You got mine?"

"I swear. _That_ I'm _not_ creeping about, not yanking your chain. Not playing dirty, which I did, getting next to Cristina like I did. The actions of a madman."

She felt Stahl shudder against her, and she allowed herself to relax in their embrace.

"I'll always have your back, Harlee. _Always_. Craziness and all. Rollin' in the deep...with you, the way it's supposed to be," he muttered into her scalp.

Too tired, stunned into numbness and bewildered, Harlee nodded against him, hugging him tighter.

And he whispered, "I'm sorry."

"Apology accepted," she promptly whispered back, her heart and mind yielding as one.


	14. Chapter 14

He had what he'd come for, but he wanted more. He laid the hairbrush down, and looked askance at Cristina. She was sound asleep, but as he moved to leave her room, she suddenly stirred. Twitching, Robert froze, nearly going into cardiac arrest as his rapidly beating heart spazzed. Warily, his eyes were trained on the sleeping teen, willing her to remain that way. Before his eyes, the confines of the room seemed to somersault. If she awoke, realize there was an intruder and scream her head off for her mother? What would he do before she had the chance? Drop to the floor, melt into it and roll under her bed? Persuading her to think she'd been dreaming? Or, instead, fly to her bedside? Snatch the pillow out from under her head and smother her to death? Cristina was a lovely, gorgeous, just like her mother, but she stood in the way between Harlee and him.

Robert's fevered mind raced; sweat beaded across his forehead. It was one in the morning. He had an open-door policy with Harlee's house. He could get in and out of it as he pleased. The sleeping girl looked fragile and sweet, lying there, lounging in slumber, never dreaming he could end her life if he wanted to.

End her life, or monkey with it?

Dare he move in closer? Caress the kid's soft, dewy cheek with his coarse fingertips? He stood there debating with himself, lost within his twisted mind as his broken heart murmured to him, pleading that he get out of there. He wanted to do more than just touch her face. But that would be so wrong. What was going on with him? Yes, he'd lost everything that mattered to him, but to have his baser instincts take over would sink him to a point of no return. Destroy what little was left of his shredded moral fiber.

He teetered, on the verge of abusing her, ending her, or letting her live.

Cristina shifted again in her twin-size bed with its lavender and soft beige bedding, and Robert, with the hair he'd stolen from her hairbrush, crept away, the sound of his footfalls non-existent. Had he really thought to get rid of the intelligent youngster? He pushed sweaty hair out of his eyes as he vacated the teen's stylish bedroom. He moved like a cat in the darkness, down the hall, toward the bedroom across and down from Cristina's with its door shut. His mind raced, hearing what was going on behind it. Harlee was moaning, groaning; each moan and groan like a dagger stabbing Robert's heart, over and over again. He listened in misery wanting himself to be the man satisfying her. He, being her lover, driving her to the heights of delirium and sheer ecstasy. How dare she allow _that_ man pleasure her. It was wicked, X-rated, insane!

In the back of his mind, he wept, the tears in his actual eyes about to catch up. Stubborn, arrogant pride blocked their seepage from his weary eyes. He stiffened his lower lip and kept listening. He placed both hands against the door and pressed in against it, sinking his nails in. He bared his teeth as jealousy coiled and uncoiled within him like a snake on the hunt. Harlee frantically growled James' name so many times. Fuming, her crazy cries forced Robert to cover his ears tightly with trembly hands. His head, feeling like one huge ache, pounded along with his shuddering heart.

His blood ran cold.

Each hot scream proclaimed that she was rejecting him. Robert burned to burst in. And do what? Rip them apart before murdering them? Or just snuff out Nava, and keep Harlee all for himself? He could kidnap her and never let her see the light of day again. Why not do just that? Start a new life with her as his slave. She'd be his for the taking, anytime he wanted her, keeping her in bondage, as simple as that.

Something in him snapped then. Something far from _irrational_. Prudently, his heart appealed that he be just the opposite. What had happened to his principles, he being true-blue? What had driven him to trash what he once believed in and upheld?

He got a grip on himself, sorted himself out, screwed his head back on straight, and squelched the depraved, rabid psychopathy dead in its tracks. He'd promised her that she deserved so much better than that.

How could he win her, give himself any chance at all of winning her true affections, if all he thought about was maltreating her? Whip her into submission, degrade her? Wasn't what she had learned about his creepy tendencies that had driven her into this man's arms? How many times had Robert claimed he loved her? Love didn't act indecently, and yet that was exactly what he'd allowed to take him over.

Whatever vile things he'd planned to do while he lurked through her house faded. He hung his head heavily, in shame and thought about his wonderful son. His head dipped even lower. Never would he wish his child to realize that he had a perv for a father.

He'd told Harlee he respected her. Had he lied? So, what was it? Respect, or disrespect? Was resorting to chicanery in its worst forms supposed to get him what he truly wanted? Was perversion Always what _he_ wanted? Maybe the inner voice that was more sane was right. He allowed that voice to coax him to get his hands off her bedroom door and leave her home, her sanctuary. The one he had deluded himself into thinking he had a right to violate. As he slunk away, still vigilant about not making a sound, he thought to himself:

 _What will I do? Use DNA against her? Or...keep her secret safe. Exactly what I promised her. But she's betrayed me with him. How do I forgive her for that? What's happened to me is all her fault! No son. No more career. Nothing! I've got to get everything back, and I've gotta whatever I have to, to salvage my self-respect and reputation..._

Skulking along the hall towards the entry point, where he'd easily gained access, he gently stroked his cheek, fantasizing that it was Harlee stroking him. Far from it being the real thing, it would have to do for now. The rest of what she and he would do together he'd fantasize about later in the privacy of his demented mind and the haven of his own bedroom. As he seesawed betwixt reality and fantasy, he slipped out of the house, he reprimanded himself for backsliding. Old habits ran deep.

"I'm better than this," he choked out, a tear running down his cheek.

He must overcome his sordid side, not catering to it, not anymore.

Not if he was truly serious about making Harlee really his. And if she rejected him, even after his self-imposed transformation?

Driving off in his car, he shook his head. That kind of useless, self-defeating thinking would get him nowhere, so he squashed it immediately.


	15. Chapter 15

With his back against the wall, Stahl strained, listening to the echo of Harlee's footfalls die away as she marched down the hallway. She couldn't get herself away from his apartment fast enough. _He must have a death wish_ , she said to herself. She'd warned him to stay away from Cristina. If he dared get with her again, Harlee had vowed that she'd make him pay with his life. She'd meant what she'd said.

Then why hadn't she put him down after she'd slammed him up against the wall of his apartment? Why had she carried on a lengthy conversation with him? The tiny hairs at the nape of her neck stood on end. She shook her beautiful head of hair. Just the thought of his contacting Cristina made her blood boil. He had colossal nerve, telling her how he wanted to heal her. Heal her? He was the one who needed monumental healing. He was sick, sick, sick! How many times did she have to tell him just that? She left his building still pondering his cryptic words, unable to stop herself from both dreading and feeling deeply attracted to the man who never gave harassing her day and night a second thought. He'd made his point, Harlee considered; his fevered compulsion to hound her had become the only thing that mattered to him now.

 _He claims he can heal me? What does that even mean? And what makes him think I ever want to see him again_?

Yet, even thinking about seeing Stahl again was exhilarating, prompted her to begrudge acceptance of the way he'd gotten under her skin. The topper was, as bizarre as it was, he was her catnip. Driving away, Harlee muttered, "You heal me...I heal you. Is that it?"

Back inside his apartment, Robert was reliving Harlee's exquisite, addictive touch, jonesing for her hands manhandling him. He still hadn't come off the wall. The smile plastered on his face gave indication that he was transfixed, lost in the splendor that was Harlee, _his_ Harlee. His divine obsession.

Crazy ideas chased even crazier ones that were in his head. When his phone rang, he seemed not to hear it, but the caller wasn't giving up after all those rings. Moving as if in slow-motion, Robert shuffled over to the counter. Seeing who this was surprised him.

"Cristina..."

"Yes. I...I..." There was a long pause and then she began again: "Why isn't Miguel going to reach out to me anymore?"

Biting his lower lip, Stahl said, "Because he's broken off all contact."

"Why?" Cristina pressed.

" _That_ I don't know," Stahl insisted, but he told himself that her coffee cup he'd swiped with her DNA on it to be analyzed, would tell him what he desperately needed to find out. He could hear the tears in her voice, overpowering it.

"Isn't there any way you can contact him again?"

She touched his heart, and he assuaged, "If he reaches out to me again, you'll be the first to know, Sweetie. Promise. How's that?"

Stumbling over her words, she haltingly replied, "That sounds good. Thank you. I know you've really tried to get to the bottom of this."

Stahl, knowing his true motives, nodded and mumbled, "It's become more than a job to me. It's become my mission. I won't rest until I-" He cut himself off abruptly, almost blurting too much. Far more than Harlee's child should know. "I appreciate your reaching out to me. Sorry about what happened this afternoon, Sweetie. I have lots of enemies in my line of work. One of them was tailing me yesterday and I didn't want you in any danger because of me. That's why I told you to leave the area immediately. I didn't mean to frighten you. I wanted you to be safe."

The strikingly fresh young face of Harlee's innocent daughter flashed in his mind. Yes, keeping Cristina safe wasn't a game to him even though she was useful to him in his twisted quest for keeping Harlee near.

"Am I forgiven?" he asked, trying hard to pass himself off as guileless too, as he stood facing his kitchen with a blank face.

"I'm not angry with you. I just didn't understand why you couldn't talk with me and rushed me off."

"Now you know," Stahl said, thinking about how angry, yet baffled Harlee had looked mere moments ago before she'd stormed out. _I know I can heal_ _you_ echoed within his mind for as many times. It was the most comforting thought in the world. "I'm sorry about Miguel..."

"I know you are, and thanks for everything you've done so far. I have this feeling he'll reach out to you again," Cristina remarked and was about to add more, but Stahl got his words in quicker.

"I haven't done a thing, but thanks for your thanks." He smiled sadly.

"You've kept me in the loop," Cristina objected, then whisked in, "You've done more than you know."

"I'll call you if and when I have something," Stahl promised.

"Thanks. Goodnight." Impulsively, she piped up, "You're the best!"

Stunned, he caught his breath. _Such a good, sweet kid_ , he thought. "Night," he returned and waited until the hopeful teen ended the call. Laying down his phone, he stared into the half-lit space of his sterile-looking kitchen. Muttering under his breath, he renewed his monologue:

" _Harlee_...your secrets are poisoning you. Can't you see that? If you can't, I can. I love you too much to let them destroy you. If it's the last thing I ever do that means anything to you...I'm a man of my word. Things are going to be different from now on. No more stupid games. I. Will. Heal. **_You_**! Or...die trying..."

He closed his eyes and wept, for a few suffocating moments he felt as if he couldn't breathe. His chest squeezed by some invisible darkness. His face was wet with sweat and tears. He smudged away his tears with his thumbs and choked out one last sob.

 _What if I fail_?

His heart pounded in dread.

"It's all gonna work out," he whispered, slurring the speech of his pep-talk. He wrapped his arms around himself, holding on tightly, concentrating his power of thought solely on Harlee, his 'cause.' "I. Must. Heal. **_You_** ," he vowed. "I'm the only one who knows you better than you know yourself. Only **_me_**." He continued to tremble.

Raw sarcasm were in his words that barely concealed the deep pain beneath them.

"You are only as sick as your secrets..."

His heart stopped racing, pacing itself, and his body shook less, feeling himself drifting off to that elegant, far-off land of his imagination's invention where Harlee and he were never apart, deeply in love, always and forever.

Whenever he looked into her eyes, he could read the truth in them. Those perfect, perceptive eyes of hers, always pulling him in. They spoke what she couldn't. Harlee was powerless to escape the grave she was digging for herself, digging it deeper and deeper because of this life she'd chosen to live. She truly needed saving, and it was up to him to save her from herself.

And, he would...


	16. Chapter 16

"Why so quiet, Harlee?" Robert asked his prisoner whose head lolled at the moment. He tried sounding sympathetic, but the veneer was wearing thin. "I told you if you didn't eat, you'd suffer."

Not lifting up her head as high as he expected her to, she mumbled, "What do you call this? Tying me up like I'm an animal in this chair?" She raised her head a fraction higher, wanting to push her contempt for him into his eyes that had grown beadier, gleaming ever more sinister-looking. "Is this what you call healing me?" Harlee provoked. Carefully, so as not to arouse his suspicions, she twisted her hands, wincing, sorely in pain. Her arms throbbed. The stiff, obdurate PlastiCuffs binding her delicate wrists cut deeper.

"This is a process. One that'll set you free." He went around her and stroked her hair from behind. "There's still a lot of that soup left." Stahl licked his lips, which she missed seeing since his back was still to her. He brought up his other hand and began stroking the other side of her wavy head softly with deliberate care. He reveled in the silky feel of her untamed tresses, wishing that it didn't have to be this way. She was his captive; she must be, at least for now. If he let her loose, she'd battle her way out of here, leaving him alone, frustrated, regretting his decision to untie her. Gently, close to her ear, he whispered, "I won't keep you like this forever. Promise."

"Your promises are empty. As empty as the way you look at me," Harlee said coldly and got very quiet again.

A slight hint of guilt in his voice, Robert said, "I won't hurt you."

"Another empty promise. You're hurting me now."

As he kissed the crown of her head, and she loathed his touch, he admitted, "It won't get worse than this. You have to learn to trust me."

Sneering, Harlee snapped, "And you're making that soooo easy. Right? Is this the only way you can get women? Drug, and bind them...hold them hostage!"

His tone mildly scolding, he reminded, "You introduced the drug-injector first, which you were going to use on me. _Right_? I had no right to defend myself?"

"What you're doing with me now is taking away _my_ rights. _My_ freedom." As she glared at him she glimpsed some of that guilt filter into his eyes. "Did you rape me?" she asked as he stepped from around her. She already knew the answer to that, but would relish seeing him squirm. He'd have gained no satisfaction from her if she'd been out cold.

The upper hand he felt he had vanished like a single, piercing note in a song. He tried keeping his voice steady to mask the disappointment he felt. His heart aching as his mind raced for what to say. Finally, he uttered, "No. I would never do such a heinous thing."

"So, why the lingerie? What was wrong with putting me in jeans and a T-shirt?" she asked firmly.

His mouth and throat went dry. Dressing her in ordinary clothes didn't fit into his plans. An ominous tenor crept into his voice when he said, "You're so beautiful, Harlee. The most-most beautiful wo-woman..." He was stuttering! His face went stark white and his chin trembled. Shame lathered him and he willed himself to stop stumbling over his words. His tortured heart and mind writhed within him.

At attention, like a soldier called to 'ten-hut,' he sang out, "The most beautiful woman I've ever known-"

"Like you _know_ me," she taunted. "You don't know me, Stahl. You know nothing about me." _And you never will, you sick freak_... Saying those words over and over in her head had a tranquilizing effect on her. Each syllable that she shouted in her head gave her the courage to show him she wasn't about to take any of the sick stuff he was throwing in her face.

"We're going to get to know each other extremely well," Robert promised with a tiny flick of his tongue. He crouched down, in-between her legs and began rubbing her knees, running his fingertips over her flesh agonizingly slow. With hooded eyes, he breathed in her scent, a mixture of limoncello and musk. He could get so used to this, but even he had to admit, if only to himself for now, he couldn't have her like this. Of her own free will, he wanted her.

How long would it take for her to realize she belonged with him, _nobody else_. Not even Cristina...

Her skin crawling, Harlee shut her eyes, concentrating on when she was out of here and free, no longer being subjected to his dementia. How had she ever been even remotely attracted to him, she'd never understand. He was the embodiment of a degenerate possessed, a true screwball incarnate.

"So! How 'bout that soup, then?" he asked, all chipper. "This labor of love won't work if you die. I'm not having that happen-not on my watch! I've got to save you from yourself. How many times must I tell you that?"

She looked at him funny, her quirky expression making her appear thoughtful. "What's _love_ got to do with it?"

He gave her the male version of 'Betty Davis eyes,' and smiled. "Are you about to do a Tina Turner impression?" He sniffed. "If so, I'd much rather hear you do ' _Proud Mary_.'"

"You've got jokes," Harlee quipped, no hint of humor in her tone or visage. "If you're waiting for a laugh, you'll be waiting forever."

"We've got forever..." Robert simpered and his goofy-cynical expression turned into one of pure belief. "So...get a little more of that soup into you, and I'll give it a rest."

" _Robert_ -"

He snapped to attention at the sound of her soft, melodious voice entreating him by the use of his name. He kept very still then, waiting to hear what she had to say. His right hand rose until its fingertips made contact with her flawless face. The beginnings of tears shimmered in her entrancing eyes. Oh, how the fire he felt for this woman burned inside of him.

He'd fallen into her trap of his own accord. Why was he punishing her for being so exquisite? If only she weren't the embodiment of corruption and larceny. Why couldn't she be above all that? Why was he the enemy in her eyes?

"No soup. Just...jus..." She forced herself to stare into his eyes that were filled with so many unclean desires, and incomprehensible ones too. "I need a favor. After the way you've treated me, you owe me one."

"Name it." He couldn't pledge that he'd do whatever she asked. He knew what he was willing to do had its limits. If she asked to be set free, would he do that? A part of him urged him to let her go, but his darker side would have none of it if that was what she wanted from him.

" _Please_...co-could y-you..." She was choking on her words as a few tears escaped her eyes.

"Release you?"

"No. I know better than to ask that. I'm only th-thinking of Cristina. _Please_! I'm begging you. Let her know I'm okay. I'm not dead. I haven't run away. Tell her whatever you like, except the truth. Please..." The pause gave her time to substitute _Stahl_ for _Robert_ again. From here on out, maybe she'd better keep calling him that. Maybe its use would make him lower his guard and gain her the upper hand.

"Please, _Robert_ ," she begged with the cascade of more tears.

What she'd said was comforting. Was she beginning to see that she had no reason to fear that he was some kind of insufferable monster? Far from it; he could be reasonable. "Of course, Harlee. Sure, I'll let Cristina know...if you'll do me a favor..."

She cringed at what he most likely had in mind. Could she go through with his pawing, fondling, his incessant, lascivious kissing, leading ultimately to his ravaging her body? Sating himself with her anatomy? She was conscious now, and he looked oh so ready to know her intimately. What had happened to the man who'd claimed he respected her? The suit who'd said he loved her madly?

 _All a charade_ , flared in Harlee's mind. _He's just one sick creep that I wish had never crossed my path. Now, he wants his pound of flesh and I'm ready to beat him to death the second I get the chance_.

Guessing what was going through her mind, he allayed, "I know you think that's all I want, but _NO_. You'll know soon enough, and you're in for a surprise..."

"Enough surprises. I'm on overload," she muttered.

"I want you to finish your bowl of soup. That's what I want..."

 _For now_ , bowled through Harlee's brain.

"Deal," she agreed.

And he got the soup that was all piping hot, pulled up a chair and began again...spoon-feeding her beef lentil and mushroom soup and line upon line about how great it was that she had wised up. She'd thank him one day because he'd turned her life around.

While hearing Stahl prattle on and she, slurping more lukewarm soup, Harlee knew: _Today_ wasn't _that_ day.


	17. Chapter 17

This was no way to live, in-between insanity and this mania passing for rationality. What choice did she have? Christina came first, and after what had happened at her school today, it was obvious. Painfully obvious. She would have to get better control of herself. _Her_ fogginess, _her_ fear and, yes, it very well could be _her_ paranoia over Stahl was bleeding into her daughter's mental and emotional health. Harlee shuddered. Whether her tormentor was actually here in the city, actively stalking her, or torturing her in her dreams and psyche, she knew she must cope better than she had been doing.

She had to do better for her daughter's sake. The linchpin of her world, her beautiful Christina.

Harlee knew better than to ask. Woz told people what he wanted them to hear, when he wanted to tell them. Harlee made no excuses for her actions of late. Woz was always the toughest person in a room. But, he also had a heart of gold, if, and that if had to be ginormous, he liked you. Harlee was walking a thin line with that of late too. Woz didn't like many people. His latest bete noir happened to be slimy, Jordan Ramsey, the ruthless leader of a mysterious unit within the Intelligence Division. Harlee never imagined she'd be facing such terrors within and larger than life monsters without.

Good or bad, her decisions were still her own...

Like the one she had just made: When she confronts Stahl again, she won't be his captive. She'll be the captor, seeing he gets the punishment he richly deserves.

No one could tell her differently. She hadn't been hallucinating; she'd seen him. As clearly as day, he'd been on that smelly, dirty J train heading uptown. He was stalking her, and it was only a matter of time before he'd man-up and come out in the open. Stop hiding in and behind shadows to show himself. She knew what lurked behind his hungry, pale eyes. Her downfall, of that she was certain. He'd come so close when he'd imprisoned her in that sprawling house with its secret hiding places and unceasing drafts. Her blood spilling from her vein when she'd slit her skin, to make her desperate bid for freedom...

Harlee, with a sigh, whispered in her now-empty house, "He's out there. I can feel him. Never the straight shooter, that one." Christina was sleeping over a friend's house tonight so they could study for a French test, tomorrow. The single, harried mother raised a thin eyebrow. "We're all crooked cops..." And then lowering her voice, as if she wasn't alone, she admitted, "Get this. He wants to save _me_. Like he's some kind of freakin' saint." She couldn't stop herself from gulping.

While rubbing her chin with her index finger, she thought she heard something. Something creepy. Although she was tougher than a rock, she froze, panic-stricken, feeling softer than a marshmallow. Everything that had happened to her in that house came flooding back. Was he here? Had he somehow found a way to worm his way into _her_ house... _again_!

She opened her mouth, wanting to speak, fearing that if she did, all she would do would be to squeak. Tightening up her bravery, she spoke in a strident voice, "I know you're here. You're not fooling me. Not this time." Her hand was already gripping her gun. "Come out! Show yourself! Stahl! I won't tell you again!"

Her house seemed to go more silent. Stiller than a tomb. Her hand wobbled; the gun she held faltered. But her glare had a 'I'll take you down quicker than you can blink' quality to it. Before there's time to gain strength and resolve from that thought, Harlee nearly unraveled when hearing the convulsive ringing of her doorbell.

 _His nerve is a force of nature...I give him that_ , Harlee begrudged. _I'm ready for you this time, you perv._

She crept to her front door, her finger leaning against the trigger of the gun she had a firmer grip of now. Pointing it at the door, she announced in a steely tone: " _Who_?" Was that a baseball cap the figure was wearing, she tried to make out.

"Hey, Harlee, it's me!"

"Oh, it's you," she barked back in kind. She lowered her gun and wasted no time unlocking the door. Sounding exasperated, she exhaled, "Woz. What're you doing here?"

Stepping inside, he imposed, "What am I not doing here?" He threw her a crazy look. "I'm not going to have you lose any more sleep worrying that your wack-job psycho's gonna break in at any moment. To harm you any more than he already has."

"Yeah? So?" Harlee glowered, secretly grateful that her commanding officer was offering what she thought he was.

"I'm spending the night with Linda's blessing. My wife won't have it any other way. She's worried about you, and you know I am. Harlee, if you don't get some decent sleep, you're gonna go Bellevue bonkers. The men in the white coats will haul you away in a padded van. Your couch pulls out, right?"

As she followed him into her dimly-lit living room she confirmed, "Yeah, Woz, it pulls out. I'll get some bedding." Her arms went around him before she buried her face into his side. "Thanks." She peeked up at him from under his arm.

"You love me...so you said."

"Yeah. I love you."

"Well, Harlee, I love you too. So here I am, putting my love where my mouth is."

She hugged him harder, taking in a deeper breath. "Hungry?"

"As a matter of fact, I am. Starved. Appetite's coming back. A good sign, according to my doc."

Harlee laughed. "How does a leftover meat loaf sandwich sound?"

"Like you putting your love where my stomach is."

"Done."


	18. Chapter 18

Harlee thought about the frenzy going on in her head. It was a nightmare! This terror she felt, day and night. She had slid down the bathroom wall, feeling her world implode. There was no way to escape Stahl. He was everywhere! Even in her brain like he was in the stall she had just opened. His eyes flashing wickedly at her like the evil creature he was. She drove her head up against the unforgiving wall several more times. The mad action did nothing to clear it. She sobbed openly, but didn't dare move. For fear Stahl would burst out of the stall and attack her.

He doesn't fool her. Not any more. He doesn't want to save her from herself; he wants to possess her. Capture her, make her his prisoner, the way he'd confined her in the mansion of horror. He won't stop until he's won. But she can't let him win, not now, not ever. There was Christina to safeguard. The thought of her daughter made Harlee brace up. She'd taught her baby girl how to shoot. If Stahl came after her again, Christina would take him down if she had to. Harlee's knotted stomach unknotted a bit while she thought that.

Where was Christina now? Harlee's mind raced to come up with that answer. She couldn't remember and began trembling, imagining her daughter at Stahl's mercy despite Christina's proficiency with a weapon. Harlee squeezed her eyes tightly shut again, unable to free herself from her self-made prison, this restroom had suddenly become. It was as though an invisible chain were wrapped around one of her legs. The more she struggled to pull away, the stronger the restraint became.

She chanted the words she had been chanting moments ago. " _Help me! Help me! Help me_!" Even to her own ears, her cries for help sounded feeble, pathetic and horribly weak. This was what he'd done to her, and she hated herself for becoming what she despised. Cowardly, shrinking at shadows in the night. Afraid she would never be fear of this torture.

All at once, through a fuzzy, encompassing haze, she saw Christina. Her daughter edged closer to the stall where Stahl lurked.

"No! No-Christina no!" Harlee wailed, at last, finding her resolve to get up on her feet. She lunged at her daughter in an all-out attempt to stop her from getting too close to the danger zone. "Don't! Get back! _Christina_!"

The door of the stall banged open as Harlee shrieked. Her daughter vanished behind it; all Harlee saw was Stahl's hands snatch her away. She beat on the door hollering and screaming at the top of her lungs, begging for him to open that door. It wouldn't budge. Christina was gone! And all Harlee heard was the haunting voice of Stahl sounding victorious. He had the next best thing to the actual prize. He had the prize's flesh and blood, which would do for now.

"Give her back, Stahl! You sick prick! Give her back!" Harlee ranted.

When Tess Nazario charged in, that was what she saw. Her hardboiled friend and fellow one of NYC's finest carrying on like a madwoman possessed. She caught the wild-eyed Harlee's eye and raced up to her. "What are you doing?"

"Still banging her fists against the stall door, Harlee shouted, "He's got Christina! He's got her. I'm gonna make him give her back even if I have to kill him with my bare hands!"

Tess forcefully repeated, "What're you doing? _Harlee_ , Christina's not here. Certainly, Stahl isn't. It's just you and me. C'mon. C'mon. Get a grip, woman!" She stared at her rivetingly for several moments more. More softly, she said, "Christina's safe."

"No, no she isn't," Harlee insisted, regarding Tess as though the tough policewoman made no sense whatsoever.

"Yes she is," Tess stringently enunciated, taking Harlee under her arm like a wounded compatriot. This was it; the stress had finally won. Harlee had reached her breaking point. She truly needed help in professional form. "I'll take you to her," Tess said kindly.

Like a glimmer of hope spiking through the haze, Tess' words hit home. "You will?" Harlee breathed, through gasps.

"Yeah. I will. C'mon. Let's go. We're outta here."

The women, Tess supporting Harlee and Harlee leaning heavily against Tess, stumbling, emerged from the Ladies' Room and into the frenetic commotion of the stationhouse. As curious, questioning facial expressions greeted them, Harlee whispered, "I need to see Christina now."

"Sure. I know you do. I'll drive you home, where she is." Tess fended off those curious, questioning looks, all the while guiding Harlee away from chaos, bent on finding what would be best for her friend. Getting her back on the road to sanity.


	19. Chapter 19

Tess brought her home, just as she'd promised, but the labor of concern hadn't been easy. Harlee was on hyper-alert the entire ride to her home. Narrowing her eyes at every street corner and intersection. She couldn't stop insisting that Stahl was everywhere, taunting her, threatening to carry her off again to another of his hideaways. Harlee just knew he had numerous lairs throughout the city.

Convincing her to get out of the car and into her house had been a task Tess hadn't counted on being as hard as it had been. After much coaxing and convincing, assuring her that he was nowhere on her street, Tess got her out of the car and into her brownstone. Unfortunately, Christina wasn't there, which sent Harlee into a panic.

"You said she'd be here, Tess!" she shouted, searching the corners of her house with wild-eyed fanaticism as she raced around the room. She felt her face heat in anger, knowing she'd been right. Stahl, that vile maniac had Christina! This was worse than she being his prisoner. So much worse! Her cherished daughter in the clutches of that madman! Harlee began shaking violently as her worse imaginings of what he was doing to Christina beset her.

" _Please_! _Calm down_! Tess implored, running up close to Harlee, as though she could force her into stability and presence of mind.

" **Don't** tell me to calm down!" she stormed back, wringing her hands while pacing the room like a caged lioness. Her silky, fluffy mane shivering in agitation; jumping out of her skin might occur next, which wouldn't have been such a big surprise.

During the midst of such blistering turmoil, she hadn't thought once about calling Christina. Tess brought it up, chiding herself for not having thought of that sooner. "Where's your cell?"

Harlee threw Tess a blank look, the mother's face suddenly drained of color. She wasn't sure she knew. Had she left it on her desk at the stationhouse, or had she left it behind on the bathroom floor? Wait—had she even brought it to work this morning? In the flurry of reminding her child to stay razor-sharp alert and wary, had she left it here? Was she afflicted with some peculiar strain of amnesia?

"Can't remember?" Tess poked with a raised eyebrow.

Sounding puzzled, and with a scrunched forehead as she scratched it, Harlee supplied, "Not sure when I had it last…"

"Use mine then," the hardboiled detective offered, squinting encouragingly at Harlee.

Taking it from her gratefully, she nodded. Sure, Christina was a speed-dial on her mom's phone. That number was imprinted on her mother's brain. "Thanks, Tess."

"Don't mention it." Several seconds whizzed by as the phone did its thing. Tess prayed that Christina answer in the next moment, or her mother would have the conniption to top all of the previous conniptions she'd already had.

The phone kept ringing, unanswered. Tess saw Harlee's face cave, implode in on itself…until… "Christina!" Harlee shrieked, bowling over to her daughter who was coming into the room at that precise moment. The fog was lifting. She was here, safe and sound.

"Mom?"

Harlee enwrapped her child in her arms, smothering Christina with frantic kisses. "Where have you been?" she furiously panted, squeezing her with all her might.

Startled by her mother's exuberance, she gasped in alarm, "At school. Where else? Like I'm not supposed to be there? _Mom_ …"

Tess held back from saying something smart, taking the mother and child reunion in stride. Considering the circumstances, she couldn't fault Harlee. If she were in her shoes, sorely glad that she wasn't, she'd react the same. Robert Stahl was out to get Harlee; if Christina wound up collateral damage, in his out-of-kilter mind, so be it.

"Do you have the gun?" Harlee demanded.

Christina was slow to answer, remembering that her mother had strictly told her not to tell anyone about it. Especially her fellow cops.

Tess' eyebrows jumped to attention. "You've got her packing?"

Both Christina and Harlee looked suspect; mother and daughter slowly shrugged, admitting as much.

" _Harlee_ ," Tess breathed, clearly disapproving. "Guns and schools don't mix."

"It's not for show and tell. I smuggled it in, and keep it in my locker. _Nobody_ knows about it. _Nobody_. At the end of the day, it's with me, like Mom says it should be."

"How do you get it past the metal detectors?" Tess interrogated.

"What metal detectors? My school doesn't have any. It's private. We're talented." Christina rolled her big, beautiful eyes. "And not lame. The kids don't come to school to kill each other. We're there to learn. If anybody acts up they get dealt with by the school. It's strict."

"Okay," Tess conceded, "I get it.

"She knows how to use that gun. I taught her myself," Harlee proudly divulged.

"I bet you did," Tess cracked, giving Harlee a regal smirk.

"I can handle it, Tess," Christina defended. "You should see me at the firing range. I get mostly bullseyes every time."

"She really does, and I'm not just saying that 'cause she's mine," Harlee vouched, then proudly, claimed, "my kid's responsible. She knows why she has it." She switched from Tess' face to Christina's. "Have you seen him yet?"

"No, Mom. Haven't. Not yet, but I believe you when you say he's watching us. Both of us. If he comes at me, I'm ready."

Taking her girl into her arms once more, Harlee awarded, "I know you are, _Mija_. That's why it's good for you to have it. He won't get his hands on you like he did me. I nearly died at his dirty hands." The grim flashback, awash in blood, of her dying out in the open as she almost had, gripped her. Momentarily throwing her back into the day and nightmare of having been his desperate victim.

"But, you didn't," Tess quietly reminded.

"No. Which is way he's never getting that chance ever again. With me. And most of all never with my _tesoro_. _Mi gozo y vida_." She kissed the top of Christina's head then gazed deeply into her eyes. " _Mi preciosa_ Christina…"

Enveloping both of them in her arms, Tess said accordingly, "Amen."


	20. Chapter 20

As she hurried up the steps to her brownstone, Harlee couldn't shake the feeling that she was being watched. Being stalked was more the foreboding perception. She kept looking around, seeing no one. But knowing 'he' was out there…somewhere, waiting to get her, clung like a shroud. The tiny hairs on the back of her neck were on end as every nerve in her body prickled.

Where was he? Stahl was driving her completely crackers. When she gulped the dryness in her throat gripped it. Her head swam, the dizziness trapped within it blurred her vision. She snapped her head to her right, expecting to see him come from around the van parked in front of her house. It was broad daylight, but what did that matter to him?

The man, obsessed with her, wouldn't let a little thing like bright sunshine stop him. Harlee inhaled deeply with her house keys jiggling in her unsteady hand. Her nervous twitching clumsily guided it to the lock. She narrowed her eyes, boring holes in the door with them. She hated what she'd become. He had her tied up in knots, and she blamed herself for that instead of him. She should have had more control. But as the days and weeks wore on she had less and less.

She threw another look over her shoulder, forgetting all about sticking the key in the lock. Again, she was rewarded with nothing; he was playing her. She was more convinced of that than ever. Harlee shook her head, always at a loss over what to do. He was cruel and had to be stopped. Maybe she would be the one to make the first move.

Get out of this crazy, cantankerous city for good. Leave the 64 with its corruption, chicanery and collusion behind, never looking back. All the duplicity and conniving, the lies and cover-ups, the death had made her beyond sick. Was this what she wanted for Christina? Her child was taking drugs! Taking them to do well in school was no excuse. It was infamous. Had she forced her to resort to such an extreme? What example was she really setting for her daughter?

She was all for her baby carrying around a gun everywhere she went. Not giving the aberration a second thought. Had the rationalization of insuring her safety become the new normal?

Shuddering, Harlee jammed the key into the less than cooperative lock that protested by not budging as she tried turning the key. The thought that some WD-40 would work wonders came and swiftly left her mind. She needed to get indoors. Fear of Stahl angered her yet again. That sore point was getting sharper all the time.

Her chest tightening, Harlee battled with the stubborn lock. Applying more pressure, she got it to turn, opening the door and bustled inside…just at the precise moment when her nemesis, the current bane of her existence, the man who loves to obsess over her…prevented a hitman from getting off his shot to take her out. Who'd hired him? Robert felt a strong compulsion to find out, and soon. Harlee was clearly in dire danger.

Stahl neutralized her would-be assassin, decisively vowing to himself that no one must harm her. She was his, to deal with as he saw fit. He sucked in air, then breathed it out slowly, cleansing himself. The van was open and he packed the corpse he was responsible for creating into it. Nimbly, he sprinted across the street to continue his vigil. No one would get to Harlee, not on his watch.

She belonged to him.


	21. Chapter 21

It was beyond belief! She was here, knocking on the door of this place he'd chosen to hide out in with his latest captive. Harlee! Santos! No, not the figment of his feverish imagination, who fanned the flames of his delusions, kept him up at night, pacing the rooms he bided his time in. She, the real thing, was on the other side of this door, in the flesh! The phantom paled in comparison, blighted in form and appearance by the real thing. The woman he had tied up and gagged squirmed in her hard, rigid chair, gurgling, struggling to warn Harlee about the madman bent on conquering her. Robert glared at her over his shoulder; without words, only with the hard look on his face, he warned her to clam up. His bound prisoner froze, bullied into submission.

He pressed his body into the barrier that separated him from the prize. His head and heart all awhirl, he grinned, feeling her exquisite heat through the door he felt vibrate against his body. The sweaty pads of his fingers embedded themselves in the door. He absorbed her and her delicious warmth through the door, though she stood back from it. While running his tongue over his bottom lip, he pictured Harlee as she'd been when he'd held her captive, under his complete domination. That was...until she'd managed to do the unthinkable. Cut herself, get free and she had escaped, having made it look like child's play. The force of nature had nearly bled to death, and she would have if he hadn't made the call, bringing medical attention to her that had saved her life.

She owed him, he judged, while he continued to sensually stroke the door, hearing Harlee speaking. The next time, she'd never get away. He would make sure of that. Once she was his prisoner again, he was never letting her go. No way would she escape him a second time.

He liked what she was wearing, jeans and a blouse that showed off her femininity in a most flattering way. She always wore clothes like that, clothes that spotlighted her innate beauty.

Who was she speaking with over her phone?

In the back of his mind, a Jennifer Lopez tune, one of her many hits, played in his head, played unceasingly, of late...'My Love Don't Cost A Thing...' Inflamed, Robert nearly flung open the door to haul Harlee inside, kicking and screaming, of course. She would fight him off tooth and nail. Which would only feed his bizarre addiction, his mania to possess her in every sense of that word. Harlee, pursing her lips, sent Robert into a frenzy of needing to plaster his to hers, savoring them, searing them with his fire. Just looking at her through the peephole set his soul ablaze. Harlee's eyes grew wide; so did Robert's. She was nodding, looking intent about something Robert knew nothing about. She was probably talking to her obnoxious superior, that pigheaded Wozniak. He was her corrupter. How could Harlee not see and know that?

Harlee looked good, always so good. Robert's hand went to the doorknob; his peeking through the peephole still going on. He was moments away from opening the door and snatching her inside. He never got the chance, though. All at once, she was walking away, making tracks fast. Feeling more than a little letdown, Robert soured. His heart sinking just as fast, he felt his ire spark. Where was she going? He hadn't given her permission to leave. What nerve she had, thinking, she could just walk away without there being any consequences. He turned hard, dark eyes on the Harlee lookalike. Her name meant nothing to him. She wasn't a real person to him, just a poor substitute for his hot-blooded Latina, who needed him every bit as much as he needed her. His ultimate obsession, La Reina...Santos.

He needed to show her who was really calling the shots. She must be punished so she would learn there was no escaping the inevitable. They'd be together again, and this time...he would prevail. He plucked up the knife amid the cluster of others near the sink. He studied it as though it had a mind, a mind truly of its own that willed it plunge itself into the trembling woman who'd again begun squirming and whimpering in the chair. Robert told her it wasn't her fault, nor was it his. The knife cried out for retribution. Robert kissed the crown of her head before complying with what the knife was ordering him to do.

 _Plunge the knife through her heart_!

Poor Gina Romano. Her only sin was looking so much like Harlee. When the atrocity had been committed, Robert, cathartic, never wiped the knife clean. He had another use for it. A use that would ensure Harlee would be free of her filthy life forever. She'd thank him.

"She'll thank me," he insisted over the dead woman's bloody body. "It'll all be over soon. Very soon..." Sighing, he recalibrated, lowering his eyelids. "Completion, at last."


	22. Chapter 22

The feeling that she was being watched followed her wherever she went. It was no different now as she held the bloodstained murder weapon encased in a plastic evidence bag. The knife Stahl had used to execute Gina. It felt heavy and ugly in her hand. Harlee stood at a crossroad, not far from the car she'd come here in. When and where would all this madness stop? As she stood there pondering just how far she'd go in all this, she told herself to get rid of the knife. Toss it; throw it away and just be done with it. Cast it into these surroundings and forget about it. No one will ever find it, and that will be that. Get on with your life, despite the uproar it was.

 _You have to dispose of it_ … _so do it already…_

A twisted smile, wry to its core, misshaped her lips. Forget about it? Not a chance, which was why her hand hadn't let go of the knife. In the back of her mind, the idea tickled that _he_ was watching. She kept looking around, not to spot some random person catching her in the act. No, not some random person, but none other than Robert Stahl stealthily monitoring her actions. What if what she was doing was exactly what he wanted her to do…and…he could be videoing or photographing her?

Harlee's eyes searched high and low, darting everywhere. _Hold on_. Was that a car a good distance off? Her vision hampered, she couldn't make out the occupant in the driver's seat well at all.

Those immediate considerations stopped her in her tracks. He'd planted this knife in her car. Don't ask her how he'd gained access to it, but somehow he had. Now here she was, playing directly into his foul, dirty hands. _He'd_ viciously murdered Gina; she hadn't. Harlee drew back in disgust and outrage. No, no, no…she couldn't land head first in this trap he'd set to frame her.

"You sick, degenerate coward," she muttered, sneering as her lower lip flattened. "You sack of crap! Think I'll make it this simple for you? Think again. _Baboso_! You don't add me to your list of victims!"

She had another idea…a much better one.

Not long after having gotten back into the car and driving off, she'd done the smart thing. She turned the knife over as evidence as it dutifully and rightfully should have been. Harlee hoped that he'd been spying on her. He, witnessing how much smarter she was than he could ever be. She was no dummy, and he'd better get that message loud and clear.

He was the worst man she'd ever had the torture of knowing. Deep down, she knew that he would be stopped. He was the definition of what being a menace to society meant. The biggest questions were:

 _How, when and where_ would this monster in the guise of a smooth looker and talker be brought down to receive the fitting punishment he so richly deserved? Only then would Christina and she be truly out of danger. The surest thing Harlee knew was that when he was eliminated from the equation, she'd cheer from the highest rooftop in this sprawling, throbbing and tumultuous city.

"Harlee!"

"Yeah, Woz?"

"Are you all right?" He'd caught her red-handed, zoning out for as many times today.

"I'm peachy. Perfectly peachy." _Even better than that once the crud, poisoning my life gets his_ , Harlee restlessly thought.

"Good to hear. You with me are gonna pay Ramsey another visit."

"You sure you want me along?"

"No one else but. Think he's got a thing for ya. A distraction. Keep him off balance."

Sneering with a sigh, Harlee snapped, "Oh, great, just what I need. Another Grade A psycho dogging me…"

"You're a looker, y'know. Deal with it."

"Thanks, Woz, thanks a lot. Just what I didn't need to hear right now…"

"Well, maybe you could start wearin' a paper bag over your head. Y'know…for laughs."

"Ha, ha," Harlee jeered and slowly repeated again, "ha-ha-ha."


	23. Chapter 23

Trapped in a locked box, on wheels, with a consummate madman, she was panting, wild-eyed. Harlee's heart thumped so loud and was pumping so fast it felt as though it could burst right out of her chest. This was what it felt like—a freaking lunatic, bent on destroying her was at the steering wheel. He'd done it again! Had captured her. This time, she might not be so fortunate; she might not get away…

He was at it again, telling her how messed up she was, desperately needing his help. Help, only he was capable of giving, to save her from her heinous, corrupted self. His help! What a hot one that was! There was a straitjacket in a psycho ward with his name on it. He was driving like a nut-job too, and kill them both. She peeled herself from the wall of the van as her frenzied thoughts whirled in her head.

Her fury building, she lashed out at the locked double doors as the van barreled on down the vehicle-jammed avenue. His voice dripping with condescension masking his animalistic intentions towards her, Stahl said, "I've been waiting for this for a long time, Harlee. Only I can save you. This you know." His eyes were glued to her in the rear view mirror. The blood in his veins surged, heightening the roaring in his heart and head.

Glaring at him, her eyes spitting venom, she snarled, "I only know that you deserve to die, for what you did to Gina, and who knows how many others you've murdered!"

"I set them free," Stahl calmly defended, making her even angrier. "Gina was a sad, irreparable creature. Beyond hope. I couldn't save her."

"You're sick! One sick, disgusting monster!" she spat. She caught him staring at her in the rear view mirror and when she rolled her eyes in revulsion, Harlee saw the madness in his eyes. Her skin crawled, but she pulled herself together, chiding her lapse of concentration. It would take all she had inside herself to escape him. She stopped herself from dwelling on never being with Christina again. How dare this sicko bring up Miguel! Although Zepeda was the father of her child, he had been another monster incarnate, that she had had every justification for terminating. Just give her one, last chance and Robert Stahl would suffer the same fate.

"You're like night and day different from her, Harlee. _You_ I _can save_. I _must_ save you. Can't you see? Whatever I've done. Whatever it takes, I'm doing it all for you!"

The van swerved, narrowly missing a terrified pedestrian who threw himself back on the sidewalk in the nick of time. Stahl had never seen the nimble-footed college freshman.

Harlee's answer to that stupid waste of words was unloading a round from her service revolver. The bullets blew holes in the ballistic glass, but the transparent armor never shattered. Then she screamed, "I never asked you to!" She kept firing, hoping that, somehow, the strong bulletproof material would thoroughly fail, rupturing, if she persisted. "I'll never ask you to! You're going down!" Her ammo almost exhausted, the glass finally surrendered; a sizeable fissure appeared, and the glass fractured.

Eerily, the vehicle bucked, Stahl pouring all of his energy into getting the van under control again. To no avail. It slammed into a pylon of the elevated highway above, coming to an immediate, bone-jarring stop. She seized the opportunity she'd given herself and with several more savage kicks, broke open the van's panel doors and fled. Her revolver was aimed at the van's driver side. She squeezed off another round of hailing bullets, hoping one would find its mark straight into Stahl. He was out of the van, intent on getting his hands on her again.

"Die, _bruto_ , die!" Harlee railed, shouting and firing the last of her ammo. " _Bicho perverso_!"

Not one of those bullets found its way into her nemesis, who was stuffing himself back into the van and tearing off.

Dazed and rolling on hyper-adrenaline, she stood there several moments, frozen to the spot, watching Stahl zoom away, making his frantic, maniacal getaway. Condemning her as he sliced through intrepid, Manhattan traffic, he saw only what he wanted to see. Another opportunity to salvage, preserve and reverence what he treasured most in life now, lost. What was he going to do? He'd spoiled the element of surprise. She knew he was here. She would be on higher alert from here on out. He'd have to come up with an all new strategy.

Yet, he would. He loved her, worshipped her. She only believed he was out to hurt her. Use her for his own diseased pleasure. How wrong she was! If it would be the last thing he did with his life, he'd save hers. "You only matter, Harlee. Only you…soon you'll see. Saving you is the reason I was meant to meet you. Treasure you. Guard you from the evil that insidiously engulfs you. I won't let it intoxicate you any longer. I will stop it from infecting you. Leaving you soulless. That is my vow to you. My eternal pledge…Harlee, my love…"

He stopped for a red light, mopping his sweat-drenched brow with his equally sweaty palm. He glanced up at the blue-tinged, sooty city sky, marveling how white, fluffy clouds dotting it managed to look so pure. His thinking about purity, triggered Harlee invading those ephemeral thoughts, which made him smile. "I've got to keep trying, so help me." The light dropped to green and he sped off, overcome by emotions he had no name for. "And…help you, Harlee. Help me…help you."


	24. Chapter 24

She'd shot him down, pointblank. Had kept firing until Robert had fallen. Christina had been standing behind her had asked:

"Is he dead?"

"Yes," she'd replied in a deadpan tone, her voice choked. As though it had emanated from her lungs that had been suffocating.

Harlee turned away from the corpse. Christina had saved them both by doing what she'd done, having hidden the gun her mother had given her in the back pocket of her jeans. Her brave daughter, calm, cool and collected under pressure, continued to stare at the mad man and murderer's impotent body, oozing blood. How grown up her beautiful child sounded, but how horrifically sad. This was certainly not a rite of passage Harlee ever wanted for her baby girl. Birth, puberty, marriage, yes. But not death; Harlee stopped short considering that. This was a multi-faceted tragedy.

"It's okay, Mom. It's not your fault. _None of this_ is your fault."

Christina's tender words tore at her heart. Several more strained moments passed and then abruptly, her child's voice pierced Harlee to the core.

"Mom! Mom! He's still alive!"

No—no—no! She couldn't have heard right! She sharply turned back around, her eyes all agog, her face aghast. Disbelief guided her saucer-like eyes to the impossible. How many slugs did it take to put the vicious beast down? This once upstanding Federal agent gone criminally rogue from the F.B.I., who'd dutifully touted their credentials. She had always been his endgame, and, doubly sad, he hadn't been able to embrace the reality of her no longer caring about him, long ago.

She'd come to hate him through and through. He had gone far too far; had thought she was some kind of invincible heavy hitter and joint principal combined, carrying out major criminal acts. She was one who never paid for her crimes. Incredible. She kept doing worse again and again, could kill with impunity, betray all without consequence. All he had tried to do was rescue her from being a compulsive recidivist.

She'd never understood he'd been compelled to save her because…he truly loved her. She stood over him again, looking down on him with her gorgeous, soulful eyes, as swollen as they were. Hers mirrored a host of conflicting things that roiled in his. In a subdued voice, she told Christina to leave the living room. The girl knew better than to object, not when her mother looked at her the way she was looking at her now. She should go to her room where the music Robert had put on still played. With the door closed. There was no way Harlee wanted her daughter to witness any further departure from normality.

Once Christina was out of earshot, Harlee glared at him. "Why aren't you dead?" she murmured barely above a whisper.

"I love you, Harlee," he ground out, thick beads of sweat littering his forehead. He coughed violently. "I'll never stop." He would love her no matter what, but he wanted her to be better. She had to be. For herself, for Christina and for him. She was a true wonder woman, a paragon to stand for what was right with the NYPD, that had to be her legacy.

Why had she never understood? There had never been anything arbitrary about the way he felt about her, and what he wanted for her. He loved her with a fierceness he'd never felt for any other woman. He'd been with many; but Harlee was the one—number one. His one and only. They would've been happy. True, she'd shot him multiple times, yet he refused to die. He wasn't ready to…not just yet, not until he told her to her face.

Instead of telling him he'd stop loving her as soon as he died, with her heart kicking in, pitying him again, suddenly, she softly replied, "That wasn't an option. You had no right to love me." Sighing heavily, she coaxed, "Just let go…" She shook her head, her thick head of hair so lovely and mane-like. "I meant what I said. I wasn't blowing smoke, trying to talk you out of shooting me. You made a difference. Made me take cold, hard stock of myself and what I was becoming. I won't make the same mistakes. I'm done tiptoeing on the tightrope between right and wrong, thanks to you."

Truthfully, in a shaky voice, Robert admitted, "I—I." Severe spasms racked his body. "l-lost my w-way…"

Obsession consumed; that was its track record. Nodding close to his face, Harlee concurred, "Yeah, y'did. You lost objectivity and look where it got you." Impulsivity nudged her hand to caress his forehead, his sweat mingling with her fingers. His eyes drifted shut. "I'm sorry for your loss. When we first met, I never imagined you being anything other than what I pegged you being. A model F.B.I. agent." She rubbed the backs of her fingers against his cheek. "Stahl…" His given name teetered on her tongue. "R-Robert…"

He had no words, hearing her speak his name in such a soft, melodic tone. He opened his eyes and blinked slowly once in acknowledgment. Blood still oozed from his mouth. Her fingers found their ways to it, wiping the bright red away. She owed him nothing, nothing but her contempt. But all she thought as she lowered her lips to his was to murmur, "Rest well. Good night, sweet, broken prince…you have saved me."

"H-Harlee," he exhaled, no longer able to swallow, his exhalation a death rattle. When she pressed her lips to his, he tasted cotton candy from her lipstick, and then he was no more.


	25. Chapter 25

In retrospect, Harlee knew she would wind up here sooner, not later. This was where she deserved to be. Had _he_ wanted her here? Her imagination was getting more and more vivid with each passing day. _He_ was dead and gone, but a part of her knew he would be with her always. Each passing day made that abundantly clear…

The walls of this two by negative four cell were closing in on her tonight. She was suffocating, her eyes bugging out. Her heart struggling to beat evenly. Fear nipped at and gnawed on her psyche, as it chawed on her gut. Beads of sweat, numerous and sizeable, pebbled her glistening forehead.

It was half-past midnight and Harlee felt utterly unbalanced. As though she were the singular person incarcerated on earth who wasn't comfortable in her own skin. She'd known beforehand how tough doing time was going to be, but enduring such affecting isolation truly was mind-bending. Yes, that must be it; this unnatural existence was messing with her mind. No doubt.

No matter who a person was, or what they were, or where they came from…everyone had a story. Hers had morphed into a tale of two dichotomies. She, once an okay cop, gone bad to worse to repentant. She was paying for her sins, and although arduous and fitfully hard, she embraced it being worth it in the long run. Wearily, she resettled herself on her bunk, listening to the colorful sounds of fellow inmates slumbering. She had no friends; she'd been a cop. Word on her had gone around.

Besides, she wasn't here to make friends. She'd do her time, get out, and get on with her life with Christina, who was currently in Woz' and his family's care. Meanwhile, her full time job in this place was to watch her back. Keep a sub-low profile. So far so good; no one had threatened her. For the most part these diverse women kept their distance. Only the occasional hot-heads would act up. What existed was a mutual understanding of an uneasy co-existence. If anyone had the nerve to start with her, she'd finish it. She was a trained, ex-NYPD strong-arm. 'Nuff' said.

Even so, at times, she felt orphaned and small. She ached to be held, reassured. _Loved_. She breathed in deeply. Felt the slight shudder buffet her body. She missed her child. The pain of separation physically hurt. Her heart claimed the largest share of the pain. Things were going all right for Christina, Woz related again and again. Christina's letters were lifelines.

Harlee's mind was expected to bear up under the stress foisted upon it and nurse her heavy heart. Her circuitous thoughts caused her heart to skip a few beats. "Christina…" Harlee breathlessly whispered in the dark, sighing. "Am I okay?" she asked aloud. She sucked in another breath, shallower this time. She willed her tense muscles in her leaner body to relax. She'd been hitting weights pretty hard. More wiry and ready to defend herself if anyone thought she was 'easy pickin's' because she was letting herself get soft, and try something aggressive or _kinky_ with her.

That word. No sooner had her groggy mind dug it up, Robert Stahl stood in the midst of her mind, beckoning her to surrender to the comfort he avidly wanted to give her.

But, she would not succumb, she never did, no matter how inviting he made his overtures. Her mind, as fragile and as susceptible as it was tonight, had her seeing him razor-sharp clearly. As if she'd never lethally put him down and here he was, as real as real could be.

"Go away," Harlee reprimanded, looking at him with hard eyes that threw visual stones. "I told you before. I don't need you. I don't want you! Leave me alone." Her voice had risen with each breath.

" _Hey, in there_!" a loud voice, brimming with anger, butted in. "Shut your mouth, Sista! Some folks are tryin' to get some sleep! Go talk that crazy schmooze someplace else! Like under your pillow, _bruja_ —where that _porqueria_ belongs!"

Harlee lay as still as stone, slowing her breathing. A mind was a terrible thing to lose, and little by little, prison life was stealing hers, weakening her mind's grip of reality. Despite his being dead, Stahl still plagued her. Barely moving her lips, she implored, "Just go. _Please_."

"I'd sooner have you fill me full of holes all over again," mind-conjured Robert insisted. "You need me. You said it yourself. _Remember_? I hoped to save you. You're getting there. My work's not done. Oh, no. Not by a long shot." His lips brushed the side of her head. His handsome features shone in the dark.

Unable to stop herself, Harlee whimpered like an overtired young child. Mind-conceived Stahl forged on, "For as long as you need to be here, I'll be here too. Here for you. Here to help you get through this. When you're lonely, tired, at the end of your rope, you've got me, Harlee. We'll come out of this together. We've got this connection. Like I told you. We'll always have it. That's my vow to you."

When Harlee spoke, it was as if she'd taken a crash course in ventriloquism. Her lips not moving, she tentatively capitulated, "Because of what I confessed? That you got me to see the light. You got into my head. Believed I could turn my life around. Obsessed until you—"

"Deluded myself, thinking I knew better. Knew best what would save you. Drove myself to see you as an object, not an actual person. Let the madness take me, sacrificing you. I craved controlling you. In every sense. Even the perverse. That was my downfall. My disease that consumed me. Christina was right. None of this was your fault. It was all mine, what I forced you to do…to save me. Yes. You saved me by what you did."

" _Robert_ …" Harlee answered, not making a sound. Tears overwhelmed her eyes and they silently fell. "I'm sorry…so sorry. _Please_ , forgive me."

"Nothing to forgive. Something to be strong for. The love I feel for you, that was never dirty, foul, sordid. It is as pure as your heart, _mi cielo_ …" There was silence that lasted long enough for Harlee to stop being as sad as she'd been the last couple of days. She'd find peace, leading a life of purpose and contentment, no matter what she chose to do with the rest of her life.

"Robert…" she began, gathering courage from what she was about to admit. "I could've loved you."

"And you always will. As I will always love you. You are strong, bound to be stronger still. And you will…with me by your side. Forever. _Querida_ , _mi amor real_."

"Thank you for risking it all…to save me."

Eventually, Harlee fell asleep, slept soundly, cocooned in warmth and protection. And she dreamed, fearless, secure in the knowledge that because of one man's twisted fascination and love for her, she would survive.

The End


End file.
